Kintampo Brong Ahafo

The much awaited GNAT cloth is in. Interested persons should contact the GNAT secretariat for some.

As part of payroll reforms, the CAGD will from October 2015 begin the payment of salaries of public sector employees on their mechanized payroll on pilot basis.

Employees are to take note of the following:

1. Register for a e-zwich card from a Bank where you are presently taking your salary.

2. Card Numbers to be linked to your bank Account Numbers.

3. Send the e-zwich card to your IPPD Coordinator for your records to be updated.



Take the following documents to your Bank where you take your salary for Registration:

i. Current pay slip

ii. A recent passport picture

iii. Any National ID Card

e.g. Passport/Driver’s License/National Identification Card/ NHIS Card.

Thank You Teacher
‘NEW’ TEACHERS TO RECEIVE SALARIES IN ADVANCE – MINISTER
24th July, 2015

City FM online.

Government has declared its intentions of devising structures that will ensure that new teachers deployed in the public sector are paid in advance.

This was revealed by the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, Seth Terkper in a joint interview with Citi FM’s Bernard Avle and Radio Gold’s Alhaji Suhini.

Several public sector workers have expressed concerns over the non-payment of their outstanding arrears for some months now.

A teacher in Begoro in the Eastern Region, revealed on the Citi Breakfast Show on Wednesday that he had not been paid in the last ten months.

“When I call them, they tell me that they are working on it.”

Another staff of the Ghana Education Service (GES), Philip from Suhum in the Eastern Region, complained that he has since October 2012 [when he had his appointment] not received any salary till date.

“The saddest thing is that when you visit their offices, they don’t even care. I’ve worked with the GES close to three years now. So far, I’ve lost count but it’s about two years ten months, and I’ve received nothing. My mother and few benevolent people have been supporting me,” he said.

The Minister has however revealed that government will soon introduce a new system that will address those challenges.

“We are working on putting an HRMI system in place so that everything is done electronically. We are combining the HRMI system with the payroll system and upgrading both to improve the process. We are going to test the system with new teachers posted this year. They are going to be paid in advance,” the Minister said.

He further revealed that though government earlier paid the salaries of some public sector workers while cleaning up its payroll, some salaries might still be outstanding.

He admitted that the challenge of teachers and health workers not being paid has been lingering for years, adding that they [teachers and health workers] are affected most by the development because “their fields see a lot of employment.”

Submit complaints

In a related development, Mr. Terkper has urged public sector workers whose outstanding arrears have not been settled yet to submit their complaints to the district registry.

Juliana Oppong threatened with transfer. This woman needs protection.

Information reaching DAILY GUIDE at press time on Tuesday indicated that Juliana Oppong, headmistress of Presbyterian Primary School, Akyem Kukurantumi in the East Akim Municipality of the Eastern Region, was going to be transferred to another school.

A credible source at the East Akim education directorate told DAILY GUIDE that the regional education directorate had been directed by the Ghana Education Service (GES) to issue a transfer letter to Madam Juliana Oppong.

According to the source, although the East Akim education directorate was not happy about the decision to transfer the headmistress, it could not resist the directive or some heads would roll.

An insider at the Eastern Regional Coordinating Council hinted DAILY GUIDE that the reason for the headmistress' supposed transfer was that she was seen as being a strong sympathizer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and that she was influenced by some NPP big wigs to ask the government for chalk, whereas the education directorate claims to have disturbed some boxes of chalk to about nine public schools in the Kukurantumi area.

The insider posited that Mrs Matilda Amissah-Arthur, wife of the vice president, blasted the headmistress because she (Mrs Amissah-Arthur) was told by the entourage from the Regional Coordinating Council that Madam Juliana Oppong is an NPP member who did not appreciate the efforts of the government.

The second lady came under attack after she had chastised the headmistress for appealing to the government through her (second lady) to supply her school with chalk.

The acting Public Relations Officer of the GES, Rev Jonathan Bettey, had told various media houses that there was the need to investigate the headmistress' complaint regarding the scarcity of chalk in her school.

The GES had earlier lambasted the headmistress for directing her request to Mrs Amissah-Arthur According to the PRO, the headmistress should have contacted the district education office or the director of education for the chalk and teaching materials her school had supposedly run out of.

Rev Bettey told Joy News that thousands of boxes of chalk had been made available to all educational directorates as far back as March this year, to be supplied to all schools, claiming the Eastern Region was allocated 82,391 boxes.

Meanwhile, DAILY GUIDE checks at the East Akim Municipality indicated that no boxes of chalk had been supplied since March 2015, contrary to the claim by the GES.

Old Boys' Reaction
Some old boys of the Kukurantumi Presbyterian School are angry with the GES over the decision to transfer the headmistress.

Their leader, Francis Bossman, pointed out that if the GES dared transfer Madam Juliana Oppong, they would take a legal action against it (GES).

According to a letter signed by Ben Sackey Enoch, convener for Critical Thinkers, the said 82,391 boxes of chalk supplied to the Eastern Regional directorate of the GES in March were meant to cover numerous schools in the region - which were woefully inadequate.

He said if the GES distributed the 82,391 boxes to the 26 MMDAs, then the East Akim Municipality (where Kukurantumi is located) had had only 3,169 boxes since March.

By Daniel Bampoe