NAGRAT threatens strike

THE National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT) has threatened to withdraw its services from January 2011 when schools re-open if their grievances over the anomalies contained in the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS) are not addressed by the end of December 2010.
Consequently, the Greater Accra Regional branch of NAGRAT has supported the national executive of NAGRAT to register its protest against what it described as the snail pace at which the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) was working to resolve their concerns.
Articulating its position at a news conference in Accra, the Chairman of the Greater Accra Regional branch, Mr Patrick Agboyibor, said per the road map agreed upon at various stakeholder meetings this year, teachers and educational workers within the Ghana Education Service (GES) were to be migrated onto the SSSS by the end of December, this year, but all indications pointed to the contrary.
Buttressing his point, he stated that some of the concerns the Joint Negotiation Team of NAGRAT and the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) raised over issues bordering on placement of teachers on the SSSS, which were expected to be addressed before the GES was migrated onto the structure, had not been resolved.
Mr Agboyibor, who was flanked by other regional executive members, noted that what was more worrying was when information started making the rounds that the Bretton Wood institutions were pushing the government to truncate the implementation process, which was further given credence by a deputy finance minister when he announced the postponement of the SSSS implementation to 2011.
“As if that was not enough, the Chief Executive of the FWSC was said to have disclosed that the migration of workers who are not yet on the SSSS would be in March, 2011,” he added.
NAGRAT accused Mr George Smith-Graham, the Chief Executive of the FWSC, of inconsistency in terms of his announcing of different dates for the implementation of the road map on the SSSS as a way of truncating and delaying the process, as well as whittling down the cost of implementation.
Mr Agboyibor explained that at one point Mr Smith-Graham announced the implementation month as March, and during a NAGRAT Day celebration in Ho in the Volta Region, he gave the tentative month as November, 2010 when he had on previous occasions announced the months as December, this year and January, 2011 as .
Despite the fact that the road map would clearly not be met, NAGRAT stated that teachers would be worse off if they were migrated onto the SSSS given the current arrangement, since, according to Mr Agboyibor, what teachers were receiving currently as salaries would be more than what the SSSS would offer them.
A salary chart he presented for media scrutiny to support his claim indicated among other disparities that a Senior Superintendent Grade 1 of the GES under the SSSS would receive an annual salary of GH¢5,879.64 while under the Ghana Universal Salary Structure (GUSS), the salary stood at GH¢6,475, representing a conversion difference of GH¢595.36.