Ghana Post Offices are hotspots for spreading coronavirus

The novel coronavirus (COVID 19) will shape the way we operate in many sectors of our economy.

For example, it is expected that our commitments to online technology and digitization of operations will be reoriented to minimize human contact as much as possible.

It is for this reason that institutions like the Ghana Post Company Limited (Ghana Post)- one whose services requires contact between staff and customers, and the handling of parcels transported under different conditions across the country, should be putting in place plans to go digital for most of their services.

However current trends in management under Ghana Post suggest a lack of

innovation which promises a bleak future for the company.

Unlike other essential sectors such as the banks, the management of Ghana Post has taken a very insensitive approach to its operations in the wake of the virus. It has decided to put the safety of its workers, their immediate families and the entire community at extreme risk of contracting the virus.

While I am familiar with this problem in various districts and Regions of the country, I will use the Central Region as a point of reference. My interactions with staff in the Region suggest that since the spread of the virus, the Cape Coast Regional Directorate of Ghana Post has supplied one small bottle of hand sanitizer and face mask each to staff at front desks of Ghana Post offices

to facilitate work.

That was over a month ago. Since then, management has neither bothered to

continue with such supply, nor conduct any form of sensitization for workers who come into contact with hundreds of customers daily.

Even worse, and still with reference to Ghana Post in the Central Region, the company expects its workers to work with all the motivation and customer care at their disposal.

Indeed, while workers of the company are psychologically unprepared to deliver on financial targets, the inability to meet such targets even in the wake of the pandemic are met with the highest form of disapproval.

This is management that probably knows that in the earliest stages of the novel virus in the country, a couple were infected with the virus by the mere opening of a courier package from UK (https://www.modernghana.com/news/991559/coronavirus-another-dies-at-37-militaryhospital.html ), yet refuses to acknowledge the highly sensitive nature of postal services, and take steps to protect the health of its workers, their immediate families and the general public.

As at the time of the writing of this article on the 15th of April 2020, between 7:10 to 11:05 GMT, the country has recorded 636 cases, of which a whopping 70 percent (455) evolved from within this country.

While protocol for social or physical dancing may not be entirely efficient at Ghana Post offices, there is the need to adopt newer strategies to stem the horizontal perpetuation of the virus among the citizenry. Management of Ghana Post should be advised to put in place immediate measures, specifically, the supply of hand sanitizers, face masks and veronica buckets for its workers as well as customers who are potentially exposed to the virus every day.

Anything less, positions the various offices of Ghana Post across the country as a hotspot for spreading the virus among hundreds of Ghanaians!