Labour analyst Austin Gamey has linked the increasing public agitations by labour unions and associations to concerns over a potential change in government.
Gamey explained that the current protests and industrial strikes by these groups are primarily motivated by a desire to secure payment of outstanding arrears from the current government before any transition occurs.
He noted that unions prefer to resolve these issues now to avoid the complications and delays that often accompany a new administration.
“Because of the level of mess in the economic front and huge indebtedness of government, the fear is that if they have anything left, particularly because people have the feeling that there will be a change of government, they want the present government to pay the responsibility of whatever is due them because if a new government should come, they will ask for time, which is normal with a transition,” Austin Gamey told Bernard Avle on the Citi Breakfast Show on Citi FM.
Making reference to the threats issued by the Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG) to strike again, Austin Gamey added that the inability of the government to juggle between being an employer and a government has also exacerbated the level of agitations.
“But the fact is that the government does not know the difference between when they are government and when they are the employer because, apart from being a government that takes things to Parliament and does partisan politics with them, they also have decision-making processes to go through as an employer, which they lack the finesse about it.
“Because if you take the CETAG situation as an example, they have gone through all manner of things. The boys have sacrificed to go back to work but the government is unable to stay with the payment plan arrangement.
“They are reneging on their responsibility as an employer and thinking they are always to be treated as a government.”
