Committees Don’t Promote Teachers, Action Does

For over a decade, thousands of teachers within the Ghana Education Service have endured professional stagnation on the ranks of Deputy Director and Director II. These are not abstract policy problems. They are lived realities of frustration, blocked careers, reduced pensions, and crushed morale. Some teachers have already retired without ever seeing justice, while others are counting months to compulsory retirement with fear and bitterness.

Against this background, any attempt to dismiss, delegitimise, or morally lecture aggrieved teachers for choosing to protest is not only insensitive. It is unjust. CREP Africa states clearly that teachers are right to be angry and right to agitate.

Committees do not promote teachers. Yes, a committee was formed, a report was written, and a presidential directive was issued. But teachers are not promoted by reports, directives, or sympathy. They are promoted by implementation. Nine months after recommendations were submitted and affirmed, nothing concrete has changed for the majority of affected officers. Such delay, especially when retirement clocks are ticking, is harmful. A promise whose benefits arrive after beneficiaries exit the system is a broken promise, regardless of intention.

Responsibility does not end at recommendation. It is intellectually dishonest to ask teachers to be patient while those who chaired committees, authored reports, or sit within policy circles appeal for calm. Leadership is not only about designing solutions. It is about fighting to see them enforced.

Peaceful press conferences and picketing are legitimate democratic tools. They are not acts of sabotage or disrespect. History shows that major teacher reforms in Ghana were won through agitation, not goodwill. Asking teachers to abandon protest is asking them to surrender their only leverage.

This issue does not concern only Deputy Directors. It concerns every teacher in the system. Career stagnation is cyclical. Those indifferent today may be trapped tomorrow. In five to ten years, today’s silent observers may be the ones begging for solidarity.

CREP Africa will not cry for political actors while teachers suffer in silence. We choose solidarity over appeasement, justice over excuses, and action over endless explanations. We stand with aggrieved teachers, support lawful protest, demand immediate implementation of promotion reforms, and will continue to call out institutional inertia.

Teachers deserve dignity now, not tomorrow and not after retirement.

CREP Africa stands with teachers