CETAG calls off industrial action
Members of the Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG) have called off the industrial action they embarked upon at the beginning of last month.
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This follows a directive from the National Labour Commission (NLC) for the members of the association to call off the action.
The President of CETAG, Prince Obeng-Himah, confirmed the return of members of the association to the lecture halls of the 46 public training institutions yesterday (Tuesday).
Ruling
In its ruling last Thursday, the NLC directed members of the association to immediately call off their strike before it could intervene in the suspension of their August salaries.
It also urged the association to put its compliance with the directive into writing, a ruling signed by the Director, Administration/Human Resources of the NLC, Dr Bernice Welbeck, said.
The NLC’s directive followed a plea from the association for the commission’s intervention after the Controller and Accountant General’s Department (CAGD) froze the August salaries of CETAG members who were then on strike.
Ministry
The Ministry of Education had directed the CAGD to not process the August salaries and allowances for members of CETAG.
Members of CETAG embarked on a strike from August 1, 2023, to press home demands for the government to adhere to the negotiated conditions of service.
A letter signed by the Director of Administration of the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC), Saaka Sayiti, however, said, "Any arrears before August 2023 should be validated and paid".
Decision
Mr Obeng-Himah said the decision to call off the action was a collective one taken by members of the association.
He said although the association did not agree entirely with the ruling of the NLC, as a law-abiding organisation, it had heeded the directive.
A statement dated July 10, 2023, and jointly signed by the President of CETAG, Mr Obeng-Himah, and the acting Secretary, Thomas Amponsah, said the decision to embark on an industrial action followed the non-compliance of the government to implement the National Labour Commission’s (NLC) Arbitral Award Orders and the negotiated conditions of service since May 2, 2023.
Notice
“The leadership of CETAG wishes to serve notice of our intention to withdraw our services across the 46 public colleges of education effective Tuesday, August 1, 2023, if, by Monday, July 31, 2023, the government has not implemented our negotiated allowances together with the one-off payment of one month’s basic salary based on CETAG’s salary grade as compensation for additional duty performed in 2022 payable to tutors per NLC’s Arbitral Award Order given on May 2, 2023,” it said.
The decision of the association, it said, had been necessitated by the fact that from August 2021, the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC), representing our employer, deliberately prolonged its negotiations for new conditions of service for more than a year till the NLC intervened with a compulsory arbitration following CETAG’s strike in January 2023.
At the end of the compulsory arbitration, the statement said the NLC issued its Arbitral Award Orders on May 2, 2023, granting CETAG members a new condition of service with effect from January 1, 2023.
Negotiation
“Following the NLC’s Compulsory Arbitral Award, the parties proceeded to sign off the negotiation agreement, which has been communicated to the Ministry of Finance (MoF) by FWSC since May 26, 2023, for approval and implementation.
“Surprisingly, the MoF has refused to act on FWSC’s letter, together with the NLC’s Arbitral Orders despite letters we have written to the MoF requesting the immediate implementation of the negotiated agreement.
Practically, CETAG members cannot continue to survive on expired 2020 CoS in this biting economy of Ghana,” it said.
It said that at the beginning of the 2023/2024 academic year, its members shall no longer continue with what it called the killer all-year-round academic calendar being implemented in the public colleges of education even if members were given all the money in the world as compensation.
It said the practice was softly killing teachers and that “leadership is, therefore, calling on stakeholders to adopt the in-out-out-in system to let all cohorts of students remain in school and complete the academic year together to enable tutors to take their inter-semester break.
After all, no law says all tertiary students should be accommodated on campus”.
