Wa, May 22, GNA - Teachers in the Wa Municipality on Thursday had started to wear red bands to signal the government to implement the Single-Spine Salary Structure (SSSS) without any further delay. At a meeting of School/Office representatives, the teachers expressed the fear that government was lackadaisical about the implementation of the salary structure.

They said they wanted to register their displeasure by wearing red bands and join their colleagues in other parts of the country in the struggle for the implementation of the SSSS. The teachers explained that wearing of red bands was not an indication of any strike and gave the assurance that they would continue to work and wait for the outcome of the meeting between government and leaders of teachers' unions.

Mr. Sylvester Nabengyey, Upper West Regional secretary of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), briefing the teachers on the implementation of the SSSS at Wa, said even though it was not an instrument for salary increase, workers would be better off with its implementation.

He said that the SSSS would be more beneficial to teachers as it sought to place employees at the correct pay levels. Mr. Nabengyey said "government's feet dragging on the SSSS implementation is enough warning to teachers and we want to tell the government that our eyes are red".

It would be recalled that in 2006 the government accepted the SSSS as the most appropriate pay policy to promote equity and fairness in salary administration in the public sector. The New Patriotic Party government issued a statement to the effect that the SSSS had come into effect from January this year with salaries increased between 16 percent and 32.5 percent.