The Ashanti Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, has urged the government to intensify engagements with striking pre-tertiary teachers and take concrete steps to resolve their outstanding concerns.
According to him, the continued industrial action is disrupting teaching and learning and placing an additional financial burden on parents, many of whom cannot afford to pay for private tuition for their children.
Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, popularly known as Coka, said teachers had presented legitimate concerns relating to their welfare and conditions of service, which he believes require urgent attention from the government.
“Our teachers are still on strike, and many parents cannot afford private tuition,” he said.
He specifically cited the proposed 20 percent deprived-area allowance, home-ownership support and concerns surrounding licensure examinations as some of the issues that teachers have raised.
The NPP chairman expressed concern that several of these matters remain unresolved, despite the disruption the strike is causing to academic activities across the country.
“Teachers are not asking for too much. Government must engage them, honour its commitments, and act now to get our children back to school,” he stated.
The comments come as the nationwide strike by Ghana’s major pre-tertiary teacher unions enters its 13th day, following its commencement on September 25, 2026.
The industrial action involves the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT), and the Pre-Tertiary Teachers Association of Ghana (PRETAG).
The unions have cited a number of outstanding welfare, salary and conditions-of-service issues as the basis for the strike.
Among their key demands is the immediate processing, capture and payment of salary arrears owed to teachers who have successfully passed promotion examinations.
The unions have indicated that tens of thousands of teachers are still awaiting the necessary financial clearance to enable them to receive the associated benefits of their promotions.
They are also demanding the finalisation and renewal of their expired Collective Agreement and conditions of service, which they say should have been concluded earlier in the year.
Another major concern is the implementation and payment of a 20 percent basic-pay allowance for teachers working in remote and deprived areas.
Odeneho Kwaku Appiah said the ongoing impasse requires urgent attention because its effects extend beyond the teachers and government to parents and schoolchildren.
He noted that while some parents may be able to secure private tuition or alternative learning arrangements for their children during the strike, many families cannot afford such options.
He therefore called on the government to treat the matter as a priority and ensure that negotiations lead to tangible solutions rather than prolonged discussions.
The NPP Ashanti Regional Chairman further urged the government to honour commitments made to teachers and address the outstanding welfare concerns in a manner that would facilitate the return of teachers to the classrooms.
He stressed that prolonged disruption to academic activities could have lasting implications for students and called for swift action to restore normal teaching and learning.
Odeneho Kwaku Appiah also said government engagements with the teacher unions must result in concrete action on the issues at stake, rather than remain at the level of negotiations.
His intervention adds to growing calls for an end to the industrial action and the restoration of normal academic activities in schools across the country.
Odeneho Kwaku Appiah reaffirmed his concern for teachers, parents and schoolchildren.
By 1960news.com
