The three teacher unions and the Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations is meeting today to conclude their meeting over the industrial action embarked upon as a result of the government’s failure to terminate the appointment of Dr Eric Nkansah as the acting Director General of the Ghana Education Service (GES).
This is after they failed to come to an agreement on their second day of meeting on Monday, November 7, 2022.
The parties had earlier met last Friday without success.
The almost four hours of meeting on Monday at the Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations was attended by the sector Minister, Ignatius Baffour-Awuah and his deputy, Bright Wireko-Brobbey; the Minister of Education, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum and his deputy, Rev John Ntim Fordjour and the Chief Executive of the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission, Ben Arthur, among other officers from the ministries.
The unions’ side included the President of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), Rev Isaac Owusu; the General Secretary of GNAT; the President of the National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT), Angel Carbonu and the President of the Coalition of Concerned Teachers Ghana (CCT-Gh).
Briefing the media after the meeting on Monday, Rev Owusu said the meeting had been adjoined to be continued today, Tuesday November 8, 2022.
“Well, I can tell you on authority so far so good that we have had a very constructive meeting. The parties have agreed that we adjourned and resume 2 p.m. [Tuesday] so that we continue with the deliberations,” he said.
He emphasised that “We have not ended the meeting, the agreement here is that the two parties have agreed that we should adjourned and resume tomorrow.”
Rev. Owusu gave the assurance that the details would certainly be put out after the meeting.
For his part, Mr Wireko-Brobbey said as far as he was concerned, the parties have not failed to come to an agreement and that it was a discussion that was ongoing.
He said the unions indicated that they have other stakeholders, that they would have to consult and “so tomorrow God willing, we would bring this matter to a very successful end,” he said.
At a press conference last Friday, the teacher unions declared an industrial action over the failure of the government to meet their deadline to terminate the appointment of Dr Eric Nkansah as Director General of the Ghana Education Service (GES).
According to them, Dr Nkansah was a banker and not an educationist, hence not qualified to head the service.
