Gov’t will avert teachers’ strike – Haruna Iddrisu assures

The Minister of Employment and Labour Relations, Haruna Iddrisu, is hopeful government will be able to resolve any differences they have with the various teacher unions in the country to prevent a possible strike.

Speaking to the media after a meeting with the leadership of the teacher unions on Tuesday, he said the government negotiation team “is making efforts to avert any strike by the various teacher associations in the coming days.”

The National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT), Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) and the Coalition of Concerned Teachers (CCT), have threatened to embark on strike on February 29, if government fails to pay their salary arrears.

The Ghana Education Service has blamed the delay in the payment on alleged fake documents presented by some of the teachers.

A meeting held on Monday and Tuesday in a bid to resolve the matter failed to yield any positive result. According to Haruna Iddrisu, the meeting will continue on Wednesday adding that “we are close to a decision of a sort which will guide how we will respond to the issues that they [teacher unions] have put on the table.”

We will continue to dialogue until we get them to decline the threat of the strike action. Tomorrow [Wednesday] we will make a definite pronouncement on how we intend to resolve the issue.

Some of the issues they’ve raised are legitimate [and] there are others that the GES has raised about irregularities, all which will be probed further by the Auditor General,” he added.

Speaking on behalf of the teacher unions, the Head of Compensation and Working Conditions at GNAT, Kwamena Ahenakwa-Quarshie, said they will still embark on their intended strike if their demands are not met.

“We are not interested in what the Minster presented to us. We made some progress today but it’s still inconclusive. We are not interested in the validation, which is up to them. What we are interested in is getting our money before the end of February,” he added.

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