A Member of the National Communications Team of POTAG and President of the Takoradi Polytechnic Branch, Asare Appiah has asked government to pressurize Controller and Accountant General to pay their August Salary to avoid another strike action.
This comes barely a week after calling off their three-month old strike.
Some members of POTAG at a press conference in Cape Coast in the Central Region announced plans to strike again because of the delay in payment of their August salary. According to them, the non-teaching staff are able to access their salary but the lecturers are not able to; and if nothing is done about it, they will advice themselves.
According to Mr Asare-Appiah, when tension starts to mount in the various polytechnics, it compels �Congress to decide on their next move� adding, �this threat of a strike action is avoidable�.
�Further checks I made from the Minister of Finance indicate that, they have now written a memo to Controller to pay August Salary and if care is not taken, it might go to September. First they claim they have not asked controller to freeze our salary and then a week after signing an MoU, Finance Ministry is now writing to Controller to pay our salary�it means somebody is not telling us the truth�.
He said if government is �truly� refusing to pay their August salary, it means they are not going to keep their side of the bargain as far as the signing of the MoU is concerned.
Deputy Minister in charge of tertiary education, Hon Okudjeto Ablakwah assured the polytechnic lecturers that they will receive their money by Friday, 5th September, 2014.
�If they don�t pay by Friday or Monday, the tension will continue to mount and that will not augur well. If government doesn�t pressurize controller and Accountants General Dept, they will delay until middle of the month which means it will be added to that of September and that is not what was told us� he said in an interview on Wednesday�s edition of PEACE FM�s �Kokrokoo�.
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