Education Minister Visits IPPD as Government Pushes to Resolve Teachers’ Promotion Arrears Crisis

Education Minister Haruna Iddrisu has visited the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Database (IPPD) as government steps up efforts to resolve outstanding salary placement and promotion arrears affecting teachers.

The visit, captured in the video supplied for this report, comes amid the continuing dispute between government and Ghana’s major pre-tertiary teacher unions over promotion-related salary payments, conditions of service and other outstanding demands.

The IPPD is central to the processing of public-sector payroll information, making the Minister’s engagement particularly significant for teachers who have been waiting for their new salary grades and arrears to be processed.

Haruna Iddrisu gives fresh assurance on teachers’ arrears

The Minister has repeatedly assured teachers that government intends to resolve the promotion arrears issue rather than allow it to remain another source of tension in the education sector.

Speaking at the National Teaching Council’s teachers’ symposium and exhibition in Accra on October 4, Mr Iddrisu said government had accepted responsibility for its obligations to teachers.

“Government have accepted that I am responsible to honour my obligations as an employer to all teachers,” he said, adding that government would pay the arrears dating from January 2026.

He went further to attach a firm deadline to the commitment, telling teachers: “If by October 30, 2026, your promotion arrears are not paid, then I will have no honour.”

The Minister’s assurance is significant because promotion arrears and the failure to place promoted teachers on their appropriate salary grades have been among the major issues cited by the teacher unions in their industrial action.

Why the IPPD has become important in the teachers’ strike

The payroll issue has become complicated by the process through which promotion information moves from the Ghana Education Service to the Controller and Accountant-General’s Department.

The Controller and Accountant-General’s Department has explained that GES initiates promotions through the Human Resource Management Information System before submitting the required documentation to CAGD for validation and payroll processing through IPPD2.

CAGD said that, as of September 22, it had received 6,079 completed promotion input forms and corresponding promotion letters out of an expected 58,620 cases. It said all 6,079 cases received had been processed and paid, including applicable arrears, in the September 2026 salaries.

The department said outstanding cases could not be processed until the necessary documentation was submitted and validated.

This payroll-processing dispute became one of the central issues behind the nationwide strike declared by the Ghana National Association of Teachers, the National Association of Graduate Teachers and the Pre-Tertiary Teachers Association of Ghana on September 25, 2026.

Teachers’ strike involves more than promotion arrears

The industrial action is not limited to the issue of promotion payments.

The unions have also been demanding progress on a new Collective Agreement and implementation of the proposed 20 per cent Deprived Area Allowance for teachers working in deprived communities.

Government has said it is working on all three areas.

The Education Minister previously announced that a validation process would be undertaken for the proposed 20 per cent allowance, with government targeting implementation from January 2027 subject to the necessary validation and roadmap.

The Fair Wages and Salaries Commission is also expected to engage the teacher unions on their Collective Agreement and conditions of service.

Government wants teachers back in the classroom

The IPPD engagement forms part of wider government efforts to bring the industrial action to an end.

Mr Iddrisu has repeatedly appealed to GNAT, NAGRAT and PRETAG to suspend the strike while negotiations and administrative processes continue.

Following an emergency meeting on October 2, however, the unions did not immediately call off the action. They were expected to consider government’s latest proposals and communicate their position. Reports at the time indicated that the strike remained in force.

The Minister has therefore been pushing two messages at the same time: government must fulfil its commitments to teachers, while the unions should consider returning to the classroom in the interest of learners.

At the October 4 teachers’ event, he again indicated that government was intensifying engagement with the unions and that the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission would meet them on October 6 over the Collective Agreement.

What the IPPD visit means for affected teachers

The visit should be understood within the wider payroll process rather than as confirmation that every outstanding teacher has already been paid.

CAGD’s position is that it can process promotion-related salary adjustments after receiving and validating the required documentation from GES.

The Minister’s latest position, however, is that government has accepted responsibility for the outstanding obligations and is committing to have promoted teachers placed on their new grades and receive the related arrears by October 30.

That commitment will now be closely watched by affected teachers and the unions, particularly because the strike was partly driven by demands for concrete action rather than further assurances.

For teachers waiting for promotion-related salary adjustments, the key issue is therefore whether their individual cases have moved through the required administrative and payroll stages and whether the government’s October commitment is ultimately reflected in their salaries and arrears.

The IPPD visit adds a new layer of attention to that process, but the broader dispute remains unresolved until the government and teacher unions reach an agreement that leads to the suspension of the strike and a return to normal teaching and learning.