Pay teachers legacy arrears whether Ghana is broke or not
![Pay teachers legacy arrears now is the call from over 5000 teachers who are owed salary arrears. Teachers whose legacy arrears remain unpaid have been angered by the reluctance of the GES and government to pay outstanding salaries owed teachers from 2012 to 2016. Over 5000 teachers whose arrears remain unpaid have angrily asked the GES, Ministry of Education and the Controller and Accountant General Department to make good the debt owed teachers. The salaries locked up are earnings of teachers for work done and government must not only speak of its intentions to pay but must be seen acting in that regard. In a petition signed by the leadership of the aggrieved teachers, and copied to Ghanaeducation.org, indicated that the three months pay audit practice at the time the arrears accumulated was aimed at auditing all claims put forth by the Inter-personal and Database (IPPD) coordinators. This process according to the aggrieved teachers was to authenticate the claims made. The process per the statement aimed at dealing with payroll corruption where IPPDs submitted ghost names for salaries. It, therefore, took a long time to get the salaries paid, leading to the government delaying in paying the first three months of salaries leading to several months of arrears Teachers whose salaries have remained in arrears and part of the petitioners are disappointed in the government because they were promised the outstanding teachers legacy areas would be paid in January 2021 but nothing happened to date. Read: Teacher impregnates three girls in same class at KEEA District The government has promised to pay arrears for a little over 2500 affected teachers in October and November 2021. Teachers are only hoping this new promise will not be a carbon copy of what has been happening all this while. The petition said the government’s promise to pay the rest of the affected teachers in January 2021 did not materialize. READ: Teacher Kwadwo Summoned by GES Over Professional Misconduct Nana Opoku Foster said the executives of the Association had a meeting with the Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES) and other government appointees, where they were told the 2,550 affected teachers would be paid at the end of October and November 2021. Labour unions, TUC teamed up against the Coalition Public Workers :Pay teachers legacy arrears](https://ghanaeducation.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Pay-teachers-legacy-arrears.jpg)
There seems to be total silence over the outstanding legacy arrears owed to teachers. If it is an attempt for teachers to forget, it will not happen.
The rather worrying posture of teacher unions is their total silence on the plight of members whose legacy arrears are yet to be paid.
The teacher unions have stopped talking about it altogether, and the Ghana Education Service (GES) is also keeping affected teachers uniformed.
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We are in 2021 and teachers who were recruited in May 2013 and received their first salaries in April 2015 have unpaid legacy arrears they are looking up to.
There are other teachers recruited at different times who are in the same uncomfortable conditions.
You ask yourself, how many of our political appointees employed in 2013 have outstanding salary arrears? You are likely to find none. If so, why treat the hard-working Ghanaian teacher like this?
The reality is that the GES does not seem to have the zeal to close the docket on this teachers legacy arrears outstanding on a good note.
In September 2020, teachers were instructed to send their names through the district office to the Headquarters for the processing of outstanding legacy arrears.
They were instructed to come with further and better particulars.
After all the paper works, the GES is yet to tell teachers how far they have gone with the processing of the salary arrears of those still waiting for their salaries.
The teacher unions in Ghana are also not helping matters. They seem not to be fighting for the total good of affected teachers and union members.
The government of Ghana has made claims through Vice president Dr. Bawumia that it has paid all the legacy arrears, this has been debunked and the data collected forwarded to get the right thing done, yet, there are teachers whose arrears have been stuck in the pipelines.
The outstanding salaries teachers worked for must be paid, it is their own money and earnings. Whether we are broke as a country or not, the government must pay the outstanding teachers legacy arrears.
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How can teachers who are owed by the government have the needed sound mind to teach and perform their duties? When financial matters affecting them have not been dealt with? Pay teachers legacy arrears now.