Ending cycle of delayed postings, unpaid salaries

The government last week announced approval for the hiring and payment of thousands of teachers and health professionals, a decision that has brought relief to many long-suffering public sector workers.

Yet, beyond the sigh of relief, the familiar story that has repeated itself with painful regularity does not seem to end.

Year after year, newly trained teachers, nurses, midwives and other professionals complete their education ready to serve, only to be held hostage by bureaucratic delays, unpaid salaries and expired financial clearances.

Earlier last week, the Ministry of Health confirmed that Cabinet had granted approval for the payment of salary arrears owed to thousands of health workers, including newly recruited doctors, nurses, midwives and allied health professionals.

Financial clearance has been secured for more than 17,000 health professionals, many of whom had been waiting for months, some even years, to be placed and paid.

A day later, the Ministry of Education also announced that Cabinet had approved the absorption of 6,200 teachers who have been working for several months without pay.

The clearance, according to the Minister of Education, would pave the way for the payment of arrears and bring long-awaited relief to affected teachers across the country.

Both developments are commendable steps, but they also expose a deep and recurring dysfunction within the machinery of public sector recruitment and payroll management.

It is not the first time such delays have made headlines, nor, sadly, is it likely to be the last, unless the government decisively reforms how postings and salary processing are managed.

The Daily Graphic thinks the recurring delays point to systemic weaknesses rather than isolated administrative oversights. In both the health and education sectors, the output of training institutions continues to outpace the state’s preparedness to absorb new graduates.

There is often little alignment between the completion timelines of schools, the approval of financial clearances, and the availability of payroll space at the Controller and Accountant-General’s Department.

The result is a damaging mismatch that leaves graduates stranded while hospitals and schools (many already under-staffed) continue to cry out for personnel.

Beyond the inefficiency, there is a human cost that is often overlooked. Many of these newly trained professionals relocate for postings, rent accommodation, and sometimes begin work with no pay for months on end.

They borrow to survive, lose motivation, and, in some cases, abandon the profession altogether.

Expecting young professionals to dedicate themselves fully to service while denying them timely remuneration is both unfair and demoralising.

It weakens morale and leads to the public losing confidence in the state’s ability to reward honest work.

While the Ministries of Health and Education deserve credit for securing the necessary financial clearance, the real challenge is ensuring that such crises do not recur.

Ghana needs a long-term, systemic solution; one that integrates workforce planning, budget forecasting and payroll management into a single, coherent framework.

A more effective approach would involve synchronising the calendars of the training institutions, the Ministries of Finance, Health and Education, and the Controller and Accountant General’s Department.

Graduates should be cleared and their payroll confirmation secured. Similarly, we must leverage technology to digitise postings and automate payroll integration.

A centralised digital platform linking recruitment, placement and payroll could eliminate the perennial delays and ensure transparency and accountability.

The paper also thinks there is also a need for stronger inter-ministerial coordination and legislative backing to enforce timelines for postings and salary processing.

The practice of issuing temporary or expired clearance must end.

Budgetary allocations for critical sectors such as health and education should anticipate recruitment cycles, not chase them.

More fundamentally, the state must recognise that teachers and nurses form the backbone of national development.

Their welfare should not be the result of protests or petitions.

Investing in their stability and motivation is an investment in the country’s future.

The government’s recent efforts mark an important step in addressing an old problem.

But true progress will be measured not by how many arrears are cleared today but how the cycle of delay and frustration is broken once and for all.

Our nurses and teachers deserve better.

Ghana’s progress depends on ensuring that those who nurture our children and care for our sick are treated with dignity, fairness and respect, and that their labour is rewarded promptly as it should.