Government has suspended the directive by the Controller and Accountant General’s Department (CAGD) for all public sector workers to register with the National Identification Authority (NIA) and obtain a Ghana Card or forfeit their salaries by December 1, 2021.
The latest decision was arrived at following a joint meeting by the Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations, Ministry of Finance, the CAGD and the leadership of organised labour representing public sector workers on CAGD payroll yesterday morning.
The initial move was part of government’s efforts to deliver a speedy, secured, and verified payroll service to government employees and pensioners while reducing the risk of undeserving payments or claims.
In a communiqué issued after the meeting, the two Ministries have asked the CAGD to “port the names of public sector workers in their existing databases onto the NIA platform and thereafter inform the various institutions of any unregistered staff that may exist.”
With this latest intervention, the December ultimatum given workers on the government payroll to acquire Ghana cards before receiving their pay is no longer going to take effect.
However, state institutions have been advised to encourage their staff members to register with the National Identification Authority (NIA) to secure the Ghana card as soon as possible.
There were agitations by a section of government workers and unions since the Controller and Accountant-General issued the directive on October 12, 2021, with some asking CAGD to reconsider the directive and withdraw it completely or have the deadline extended.
Organized labour insisted that the NIA should bear the responsibility of capturing government workers on its database and not compel them to secure the cards.
According to them, the decision was a lazy approach towards addressing lapses in the government’s payroll system.
However, the National Identification Authority (NIA) justified the directive, saying, it was a step in the right direction.
