State of the Nation Address-2012

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE PRESIDENT’S 2012 STATE OF THE NATIONS ADDRESS
The president on 15 February 2012 delivered his state of the nations address to parliament as required of him by Article 67 of the constitution of Ghana. In his address, the President commented on the substantial progress made by   government in pursuance of the “Better Ghana” Agenda albeit the internal and external constraints faced by the country in terms of financial resources and logistics to meet the demands of projects and various agenda.

This discussion will highlight some aspects of the Presidents address in relation to some sectors of the economy, the implication for growth and development, how successful the programmes have been and the way forward.

In relation to the Single Spine Pay Policy (SSPP), the President mentioned the introduction of this Pay Policy in 2010 with 11% of public service employees being migrated. In the 2011 year however, 80% of public service employees were migrated onto the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS) and the process expected to be completed within the 2012 fiscal year.

The introduction of the SSPP has brought an increase in the wage bill. This is to deal with the inequities and distortions in the pay structure of the public sector. This will ensure productivity in the public sector and ameliorate the problems of frequent industrial strike actions by public sector workers.

This programme has been quite successful with various government institutions like the Ghana Prison Service, The Ghana Police Service, the Ghana National Fire Service and the other institutions being migrated onto the scheme. However, the were few setbacks, some institutions like the Polytechnic Teachers were not migrated and on time and others like the Ghana Prison Service complained their salary structure were not properly adjusted.   This resulted in industrial strike actions by the sectors concerned leading to loss of productive time.

With reference to security, law and...