A government approved public sector job freeze is causing a severe manpower deficit in some state agencies.
The Food and Drugs Authority (FDA), the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI), and some ministries, departments and agencies are seriously understaffed due to vacancies created by retired staff and others who had resigned or died.
The FDA is currently seeking for clearance from the Ministry of Finance to recruit about 100 technical and other auxiliary staff to replace staff on retirement to beef up its manpower requirements.
The Deputy Chief Executive of the Foods and Drugs Authority, Mr John Odame Darkwa, told the Graphic Business in an interview that the manpower deficit had led to the few personnel at post being overstretched.
“We have applied for clearance from the Ministry of Finance to fill the vacancies in the authority, but because of the moratorium, we can’t recruit.
“We are seriously understaffed and we have to stretch ourselves to travel round to ensure efficiency and not compromise on quality on our mandate due to staff strength,” Mr Odame Darkwa said.
Another state institution which is hard hit by the job freeze is the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice, which had sought clearance from the finance ministry to fill 73 vacancies created by the exit of retired staff over a period of time.
A Deputy Commissioner, Mr Joseph Whittal, said in an interview that clearance had been given for the recruitment of 23 personnel in the transport department.
At the moment, the commission is in short of drivers for its transport department. This has led to several donor supported pick-up vehicles for the regional and district offices of the commission being left to rust in the open space.
The National Board for Small Scale Industries has also reported of more than 23 vacancies in its regional and district offices.
The Executive Director of the board, Mr Lukman Abdul Rahim, said the lack of the full complement of staff at the district and regional level was affecting the effective delivery of business advisory services.
“The few staff in Accra are very much constrained and being overstretched to their limit because they have to travel the length and breadth of the country to deliver entrepreneurial advisory services to SME clients at the regional and districts level,” Mr Abdul Rahman said in an interview.
The National Council on Persons with Disability has also complained that the moratorium on public sector employment by the government is undermining the smooth operations of the council.
According to the council, it could not execute its mandated programmes and projects due to acute shortage of personnel.
The Executive Secretary of the Council, Mr Max Vardon, has said the situation had been compounded by deficit in logistics.
The council has only two fully employed staff, a number far short of the 250 required to perform effective operations nationwide.
“What only drives the council and board members to work is commitment, but there is seemingly the lack of commitment on the part of those who are supposed to support the council,” he said.
He said due to the moratorium on public sector employment, the council cannot engage personnel to fill the vacant positions in the council.
In 2008 the IMF advised the Ghanaian government to put a freeze on public sector recruitment – except in the areas of health and education – to curb the public sector wage bill, putting a strain on school leavers and graduates looking for work.
The freeze ended in 2011 and the government has also proposed a new programme with the fund to limit the number of public sector jobs in order to free the public purse.
Information available from the Institute of Statistical, Social, and Economic Research (ISSER) of the University of Ghana at Legon suggests that approximately 250,000 young people enter the job market annually of which two per cent, or about 5,000, find employment in the formal sector.
A further report by the International Labour Organisation says that the public sector accounts for six per cent of employment in Ghana, and that of the informal private sector stands at 86 per cent.
