While the government is said to have made some efforts towards addressing the current impasse between the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) and the concerned government labour agencies, its efforts have so far not been good enough to motivate the lecturers to return to the classroom.
This is because since UTAG resumed its strike on January 10, 2022, the government’s actions and interventions have been too little, too late.
Speaking to Samuel Mbura on A1 Radio’s Day Break Upper East, the C.K Tedam University of Technology and Applied Sciences (CKT-UTAS) branch president of UTAG, Dr. Jonas Bugase said the government’s efforts so far do not in any way, address the concerns as tabled by UTAG.
He said the situation needn’t have reached this point if the government had taken deliberate steps to address the concerns of UTAG when these agitations of restructuring of base pay and other Conditions of Service (CoS) began.
“It is not our fault that government is not able to give us any guideline or has not determined the new market premium which is supposed to enhance our new CoS going forward. It would be recalled that we started these negotiations in the late part of 2018 and then throughout 2019 and then 2021. We have not still been able to arrive at issues that will make our CoS better”.
“The most basic of them was our base pay. We have made some gains with regard to our books and allowances but these do not count in our retirement. So the government had indicated that it cannot negotiate the market premium until they have completed a Labour Market Survey. They had indicated that by last October, that report would have been ready. We had given them by the end of December to finalize everything and determine our market premium and implement the new market premium by 2022. At the end of December, we had not even seen the report,” he lamented.
He explained that UTAG’s position remains that while the government has failed to state the guidelines regarding an improved market premium, the previous premiums should be restored, in the interim, while the government takes steps to implement a new one. Subsequently, the differences between the interim and the agreed-upon premiums would then be calculated and paid.
“How can a university lecturer who has studied BSc, or whatever, to Masters and then Ph.D level, earn less than ghc5,000. But check other sectors, where they do not even require an M.Phil or an MA to become Heads of Departments, they earn more than ghc8,000 or ghc10,000. What are we doing to the elite community of this country?”
“We are supposed to be the ones to drive the growth of the country by developing the critical human resource to bring the development that we need. If we are not motivated, how then do we churn out graduates who would be innovative enough to drive the developmental agenda of this country?” he quizzed.
Dr. Bugase cautioned that should government fail to take steps to address the problems, by Friday, January 28, 2022, the Management of various Public Universities affected by UTAG’s strike would have to shut the schools down because of the absence of teaching and learning materials.
The CKT-UTAS branch UTAG President expressed worry that newly admitted level 100 students are particularly bearing the brunt of the current strike.
A1radioonline.com|101.1 MHz|Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Ghana
