After talks with Organized Labour, the government has raised base pay by 30% for the 2023 financial year.
The raise will start on January 1, 2023.
This is the result of a meeting with Organized Labour on Thursday, January 12, after both sides tried to talk for ten times without success.
"The base pay has gone up by 30% for the fiscal year 2023...
As I said, this ends the COLA of 15% of base pay for 2022," said Employment Minister Ignatius Baffour-Awuah soon after the decision was made.
At the beginning of talks about the base pay, Organised Labour asked for a 60% raise and wouldn't back down, even after meeting with the government several times.
After the public sector workers turned down the government's first offer of 18%, they decided to lower their initial demand of 60% to 58%.
The government and the unions agree on a 30% increase in base pay.
But after a meeting with the government on Thursday, where Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta was present for the first time (he hadn't been at any of the other meetings), Organized Labour agreed to a 30% increase in the base pay, even though they had said they wouldn't give up on their demand.
Dr. Yaw Baah, who is the General Secretary of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), thanked the government for this change.
"The leaders of organized labor would like to thank the government for giving public sector workers a 30% raise in their base pay through 2023. We're glad that it's over and that everything went well today.
"The 30% is not what we want, but it will give us the chance to speak the same language and work together."
Dr. Isaac Bampoe-Addo, who is the Executive Secretary of the Civil and Local Government Staff Association, Ghana (CLOGSAG), told the government delegation, "We want to assure the government that we will work with them and come up with ideas to increase revenue." We know that the next time we meet to talk about base pay, things will be better."
During the meeting, the country's Finance Minister said that the increase would put a strain on the country's finances.
"As I said, this will hurt the budget, but we're sure that we can improve productivity and keep the promise we made to each other to keep the peace in this country while we look at pension and labor issues."
With this decision, the government said that public sector workers will no longer get the 15% Cost of Living Allowance (COLA).
Credit: myjoyonline