Public servants urged to write their memoirs
Public servants have been encouraged to document their individual experiences to help inform and educate the public on the workings of the service.
The Chairperson of the Public Services Commission, Mrs Bridget Katsriku, who made the call, indicated that because the public was oblivious of the workings of the service, public/civil servants attracted the most stereotypical and negative perceptions.
For instance, Mrs Katsriku said that group of workers were generally believed to go to work late and close early.
She said this when she launched the book, “In the Service of Country (The Story of One Public Servant)”, written by Edwin P. D. Barnes.
The author, Edwin P. D. Barnes, who started work in 1968 at the National Standards Board, went into the civil service in 1993, and rose through the ranks to become the head of the service.
He spent 40 years in the service, retiring in 2008.
Positives
The book, however, catalogued some positive sides of the service and its workers.
Mrs Katsriku recommended the book for all public servants as she said it dealt practically with challenges and offered the needed skills that staff could adopt to overcome them.
The book
The 396-page book was published by G-PAK, a subsidiary of Graphic Communications Group Limited.
Mr Barnes explained that he gave the book the title: “In the Service of Country (The Story of One Public Servant),” because his experience was just one among many others in the service.
He commended G-Pak for agreeing to publish his work.
The first copy of the book was purchased for GH¢1,000 by the chairman of the function, Prof. W. C. Ekow Daniels.
Highlights
Mr Barnes used the occasion to launch a foundation, the ADORA Foundation, in memory of his mother, Madam Adora Sagoe, who passed away in 2012.
The foundation will focus on the education of children in the Cape Coast area, as well as instilling leadership skills in women.
A former registrar of the University of Ghana, Mr Ebow Daniel, sharing his thoughts on the book, placed the writer among the category of sterling writers who were themselves public servants, like Messrs Alex Glover Quartey and K. B. Asante.
