Pupil teachers across the country have been asked to proceed on leave by the Ghana Education Service (GES).

Acting Director-General of GES, Charles Yaw Aheto-Tsegah, confirmed the development to DAILY GUIDE in an interview yesterday when the paper contacted him to clarify why the appointments of some pupil teachers were being terminated.

DAILY GUIDE has in its possession, a copy of a letter terminating the appointments of some pupil teachers dated August 15, 2014, from the office of the Municipal Director of Education, Awutu Senya East-Kasoa, Ebenezer Oscar Asare, which was addressed to some pupil teachers in the area.

A similar letter from the Upper West Akyem Municipal Assembly at Asamankese in the Eastern Region had also been dispatched to pupil teachers in the area.

Sources said the nationwide exercise was to cut down teachers’ wage bill.

Mr. Aheto-Tsegah pointed out that the contract between the GES and the pupil teachers was over and that the GES no longer had space to retain them.

According to him, the teachers were not regular ones and that they were regarded as contract teachers who were normally hired on a yearly basis.

“They are what you would consider to be contract teachers and when you are recruited as a pupil teacher you are given a one-year term of contract,” the GES boss stated.

‘And at the end of the one-year you are not guaranteed a continued stay to be teaching. After that, your continued stay in the service will be determined by good performance during the period that you were in the service,” he added.

He disclosed that more professional teachers had come into the service and that it was difficult to retain the pupil teachers – also known as non-professional teachers.