The Ghana Education Service (GES) has dismissed claims of wanton deletion of names of teachers from its payroll by the National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT).

The Association, last Thursday held a press conference to highlight some challenges facing the first and second cycle institutions in the country.

Amongst the issues raised at the press conference were; the lack of primary teaching and learning materials such as textbooks, chalks, the deletion of teachers’ salaries from the payroll, delay in payment of capitation grant and mode of lesson notes preparation.

However, the GES in a statement issued on February 21, 2022 noted that “Inherent in this system, is the option to query any name or amount that has been indicated on the payroll to be paid for that particular month.”

The statement added that “in instances where strange names have appeared on the payroll and generally where there is a stated reason why a staff should not be paid for that particular month but such a staff is programmed to be paid, the Validator should indicate that the person should not be paid or should be paid but not with the amount indicated”.

The Service said per complaints it has received regarding validators abusing salaries of teachers, it has issued some guidelines to avert such occurrences.

“The crux of the guidelines is that where there is a justifiable official reason why a particular salary should be stopped, the validator should immediately inform the Cost Centre Manager of the development and the reason for that,” the statement noted.

Reacting to the issue of lack of chalk and other teaching and learning materials, the Service explained that processes for procuring and supplying chalk to various schools are far advanced.

According to the GES, some urgent supplies have been made to schools in the Western, Western North and Eastern Regions.

“All other Regions which need chalk will be supplied. It is also important to stress that there are other regions where we have unused stocks of chalk and some are being moved to areas which need some urgently.”

The Service also stated that at a discussion with the Teacher Unions, it was agreed that the preparation of lesson notes should be an agreement between the teacher and his or her supervisor.

“Thus where both teacher and the supervisor agree that it [lesson notes] should be prepared and submitted electronically, it should be allowed. Where it cannot be transmitted electronically, a print-out of the typed lesson notes should be submitted for vetting and approval,” the GES explained.

The Service further noted that for any valid reasons where lesson notes cannot be prepared electronically, both teacher and supervisor can agree to prepare the notes manually.

Meanwhile, Management of the Ghana Education Service said it will hold a meeting with leaders of the various Teacher Unions to discuss any outstanding issues and concerns.