Lecturers and Government agrees on unified pay structure
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In a recent development, the codified conditions of service that will govern the welfare system and pay structure of lecturers and other staff workers in public universities has been completed in a unified manner.
The document containing the codified conditions was signed last weekend in Eastern Region, Koforidua. The agreement was between the government, which was represented by the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission, the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission and the Vice-Chancellors Ghana (VCs) on the one side, and public university teacher unions – the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) and the Technical University Teachers Association of Ghana (TUTAG) on the other.
All parties involved in the agreement defined the event as a ‘historic move’. A move that would, apart from enhancing the welfare of public university lecturers, also improve on the relationships between the state and unions in future discourses.
The codified conditions of service are now the standard reference for all public university lecturers.
As a result, this document concludes all negotiations between the government and public university teacher unions, which had previously been marked by strikes at the start of the year.
The codified document has three components of the conditions of service including the monetary, non-monetary and the Internally Generated Funds.
The monetary aspect of the codified document would inspect the main base salary, including other statutory monies, IGF structure.
The IGF is funds generated in the university internally. These funds would be used to facilitate housing, loans, medical covering, leave system, promotions and many others.
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The codified document covers all the 15 public universities and harmonises the conditions to be applied the same way in all the universities.
In an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic, Professor Charles Adabo Oppong, Director of Grievances and Negotiations at FWSC, stated that the parties reviewed proposals from UTAG and TUTAG, leading to a unified document outlining the conditions of service.
“The document primarily addresses various regulations regarding their work, such as leave entitlement, promotion, work and safety, entry requirements for lecturers, and the number of hours they are required to teach per week, among other aspects,” Prof. Oppong explained.
“This is a significant achievement,” he added, noting, “It is the first codified condition of service for university teachers in the history of Ghana.” Prof. Oppong explained that previously, the conditions of service for public university teachers were scattered across various documents, complicating negotiations.
With the new unified document, future negotiations will be much simpler, as it will serve as a comprehensive guide.
The National Secretary of UTAG, Dr. Eliasu Mumuni, expressed joy about the recent developments, stating, “Since UTAG’s inception in the 1960s, this is the first time we have achieved this milestone, and our members are happy.”
He explained that the conditions of service for public lecturers had been very ad hoc.
When the tripartite committee met to determine the base rate and salary increases for workers, it ended there unless UTAG negotiated for other allowances.
This approach had prevented them from achieving a comprehensive agreement.
However, Dr. Mumuni added that over the past six years, UTAG had focused on this goal, and they were fortunate to have finally reached an agreement.
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