Central Region Graduate Teachers end strike

Graduate teachers (NAGRAT) in the Central Region on Monday called off the indefinite strike action they embarked on two weeks ago to back their demand for salary adjustment. Mr Kwami Alorvi, Regional Chairman of the association, told the Ghana News Agency that members took the decision to call off the strike in the interest of students, particularly those in the final year.

He said members of the association also considered the assurance given them by the Ghana Education Service (GES) at a meeting with NAGRAT's National Executive last Friday that all graduates teachers would be paid new salaries by the end of next month.

Mr Alorvi said most of his colleagues were, however, unhappy about the decision to call off the strike because they were sceptical of GES fulfilling its promise, since it had failed to fulfil an earlier promise it made on the same issue.

He expressed concern about the fact that during the meeting between the NAGRAT National Executive and the GES Financial Controller last Friday, it was detected that names of members of the association in the country, were missing from the pay vouchers for July and described the situation as a "disaster".

Mr.Alorvi said that in the Central Region, only about 10 of the 56 senior secondary schools had the names of their teachers on the vouchers, while only 11 names were found for teachers in the Northern Region. There were also some disparities in the adjusted salaries, with some teachers on the same grade receiving different salaries.

According to him the situation had made some of his colleagues more reluctant to go back to work but he urged them to exercise restraint for the authorities to rectify the anomalies. During a visit to some Senior Secondary Schools, the GNA saw teachers busy at work in the classrooms. Some of the students expressed appreciation to the teachers for calling off the strike and appealed to the GES to address the association's grievances once and for all.