World Teachers Day/GNAT Week Launched in Accra

Ghana National Association of Teachers

This year's World Teachers' Day will be commemorated with a national durbar at Wa in the Upper West region, Mr Samuel Doe Alobuia, national president of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), has disclosed.

The Day will be celebrated on the theme: A Call For Teachers--Teachers Take the Lead For Quality Education

Speaking at the dual launch of World Teachers' Day and GNAT Week in Accra, yesterday, Mr Alobuia also said that as part of activities marking this year's celebrations, and to encourage pupils to be in school, the Dah D.A. Primary School--a deprived school in the Nadoli district of the Upper West region-- would benefit from the largesse of GNAT.

He said the Dah D.A. Primary School would be presented with teachers' tables and chairs as well as dual desks for the pupils while 50 school children (25 males and 25 females) from five districts in the region would also benefit from school attires, canvas boots, school bags, books and stationery.

The beneficiary districts are Wa East, Lambusie, Lawra, Issa and Sissala West.

On teachers' welfare, Mr Alobuia noted that teachers could not deliver their optimum if they were not financially, psychologically, emotionally and physically well-placed and conditioned to do so. "We recognise that in modern times, the teacher needs more than the traditional ways of fighting for better conditions of service to be motivated to produce quality pupils and students who constitute the human resource base the country needs for development in all sectors of the economy," he intimated.

Mr Alobuia noted, however, that the objective of providing quality education could hardly become real if the health of teachers and their dependants were at risk.

He, therefore, gave the assurance that GNAT would continue to fight for better conditions of service for its members as well as ensure that their health needs were taken care of.

To this effect, he said, the management of GNAT had entered into a partnership with the Sweden Cancer Foundation so as to curb the growing threat of cancer among the teachers and their dependants.

Under the partnership, Mr Alobuia said, a GNAT member and a spouse or a child diagnosed with cancer was required to visit the Sweden-Ghana Medical Centre (SGMC) at Ashalley-Botwe, a suburb of Accra, for treatment free of charge.

He explained that under the partnership, GNAT was required to contribute GH₡100,000.00 every month to the Sweden Cancer Foundation for a period of one year

He disclosed that as at August 30, 2013, a total of GH₡438,181.00 had been paid for medical services provided by the SGMC to 37 GNAT members in eight out of the ten regions of Ghana for the month of August 2013.

Mr Alobuis said the number who had received treatment at the facility and the total cost of treatment for that short period, should provide an idea of the extent to which the partnership had immensely benefitted members and kept them at work.