Teachers E-zwich payment is ‘daylight robbery’ – Nsowah

A former Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES), Daniel Nsowah, has condemned the decision by the Controller and Accountant General’s Department to use the E-zwich platform for the payment of teachers’ salary.

He questioned why such means of payment would be approved when teachers had not reported of any difficulties with receiving the money through their bank accounts as has been the practice.

Mr Nsowah was speaking with Nana Agyen Barimah on Accra News on Thursday May 5, 2016. He described the development as “sad”, explaining that: “With the facility you are providing, he [the teacher] will suffer deductions every month. Has the teacher asked to be paid through such means or it is because somebody has found his way into government and won a contract? It’s unpleasant. It is daylight robbery.”

He wondered: “What has changed that payments have to go through E-zwich?” urging that the teachers must “resist it because everyone has a bank account”.

Mr Nsowah would not buy the explanation from the Controller and Accountant General’s Department that switching to E-zwich payments would check illegal payments, especially to ghost names on the payroll. To him, teachers must not suffer the inconvenience of such a situation since they had no hand in the current situation.

His comments add to those expressed by the Coalition of Concerned Teachers (CCT) which has kicked against the method of payment saying it is fraught with technical challenges, which will make it difficult for teachers to access their salaries.

It has warned of labour unrest should the move be approved.