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25.04.2015 Politics

No Job Cut -Says President

By Daily Guide
President John Dramani MahamaPresident John Dramani Mahama
25.04.2015 LISTEN

President John Dramani Mahama has dismissed reports that there will be retrenchment in the public sector in 2017 as a conditionality for the International monetary Fund (IMF) bailout.

Media reports had earlier suggested that some public workers would be laid off as a condition for the $918 million support being offered the country by the Breton wood institution.

But Mr Mahama, speaking at the 8th Conference of Public service Chief Directors, Chief Executives and Chairpersons of Governing Boards at Koforidua in the Eastern region yesterday, noted that some people were misconstruing an impending rationalisation exercise in the public sector to mean retrenchment.

“There is no way government will lay off workers in the public sector, so such reports in the public are totally false. The IMF has not given government any conditions to cut down jobs,” President Mahama underscored.

Right-Sizing Exercise
However, on page 17 of a document entitled, “request for a three-year arrangement under the extended credit facility,” posted on the IMF website on April 21, the government had pledged to bring reform to the Civil service by forming a taskforce to make recommendations to the government as part of the 'right-sizing exercise.'

'The government aims at bringing the wage billto- revenue ratio down from 53 percent in 2014 to 35 percent over the medium term, in line with the regional ECOWAS target,' the document stated, adding, 'This will require wage restraint over the full three-year programme period, with increases consistent with expected disinflation.

'The authorities will design a civil service reform strategy during 2015 with the assistance of development partners, which will aim at increasing the productivity and rationalising the size of the civil service. As part of this reform, the government intends also to review the role of subvented agencies,' it averred.

Meanwhile, Ghana will receive the second tranche of the financial package from the IMF in July this year.

Ghana's Central Bank received the first tranche of the $918 million bailout package from the Fund on Tuesday, April 14, 2015.

The amount is expected to shore up the ailing Cedi which has already depreciated by close to 15 percent this year after a marginal stability in the last quarter of last year following the infusion of $2.7 billion into the economy through an oversubscribed $1 billion Eurobond instrument and a $1.7 billion syndicated loan from the Ghana Cocoa Board.

Public Sector Recruitment
Mr Mahama, while speaking on the theme, “Leading and managing the Dynamics of Change through the Professionalization of the Public service,” hinted that the growing perception that recruitment into the public service had been stopped was not accurate.

The president further stated that what government intends doing is to stagger the recruitment and by that, coordinate it, to ensure that there is no mass recruitment into the public sector.

President mahama posited that government was embarking on a massive 'staff rationalisation nationwide', adding that 'some Ghanaians have misconstrued the concept to mean that people are going to lose their jobs.'

Citing the ministry of education as an example, he stated that the staff rationalisation process had led to government posting over 10,000 teachers to very deprived areas, adding that the rationalisation process is not a way to retrench people but a way to enhance efficiency.

Mr mahama however entreated heads of the public service to assist the government to fight corruption.

Mrs Bridget Katsriku, Chairman of the Public service Commission, also called upon the leaders to be committed to their promises and help the government to achieve its goals.

From Daniel Bampoe, Koforidua

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