Solidarity Forever
on Anthony Lovat in Bolgatanga (Ghana), 25/Nov/2010 08:57, 34 days ago
As a teacher, I have always believed in the public sector. I have worked in three very different schools in my career as a teacher in Britain and almost every teacher I’ve worked with has been massively dedicated. My sisters are both nurses and, as a vocation, I know they are committed and hard working public sector workers. I grew up watching my parents’ example, passionate and caring public sector teachers who worked so hard and dealt with so much stress. Ihave always seen public sector workers going above and beyond, working for the greater good and finding reward in their hearts, not their pockets. I have resented the way private sector corporate culture and language has been creeping into British schools. The stereotypical private sector worker takes on extra work only for a bonus, a reference or a promotion. A friend of mine once worked for Heinz and told me of a fellow employee who, at his own wedding, set up a Heinz stand. This puzzled me. Can one really care that much about Heinz? Will society crash around us if people switch to buying Branston?Driving along a deserted dirt road between two remote villages in the Upper West region recently, we passed a white man on a bike weighed down with saddle bags. A well built and tall individual, particularly compared with the skinny locals, he wore tight lycra that emphasised every bulge. His shock of reddy brown hair was like a mobile beacon and his golden skin indicated he’d been on the road for a while. There was only one possible location he was heading for and we met him soon after at the hippo sanctuary. We guessed wrong: he wasn’t French but was an Irishman called Chris. Formerly working for the Irish government as an economist, the financial meltdown in Ireland led to him being made redundant. Not wanting to be idle, Chris saddled up his bicycle and embarked on a solo cycling tour from Dakar in Senegal to Accra, passing through the Gambia, Mali and Burkina Faso en route. We were most impressed at his adventurism, especially as he’d never been to West Africa before. The locals must think he’s crazy.Late that evening, I was sat with Chris digesting the spaghetti and canned fish we’d cooked on the coal pot. He asked about my work and about the challenges of improving education in Ghana. I reeled off the usual litany of problems: large classes, overloaded syllabus and, particularly, unmotivated teachers and civil servants. Chris asked me if many workers are unionised in Ghana. I admitted that they were and he gave a smug, knowing smile.My gut reaction was to defend unions. I have always been a member of a teaching union and have always seen it as defending the profession. My work here has been to support the science teachers’ union – the Ghana Association of Science Teachers (GAST). We’ve run training workshops and discussion groups; shared good practice and advocated for priority given to the teaching of science. The GAST integrated science textbook is the most widely used and, in my opinion, most well thought out book available in Ghana. The GAST network of teachers has been vital in me reaching out to science teachers across the region. It has 800 members across the country. How can unions be a bad thing?In recognition of the work that GAST having been doing in the Upper East Region, admittedly with great support from VSO, the national executive of GAST, along with the chairpersons from each region in Ghana, have selected the Upper East to host their events for the year– the first time it has come here in 25 years. This week is Science Week so the executive members of GAST have all travelled from across the country to be in Bolga. For most, it is their first time venturing into the north of the country. They act just as tourists. They have gone to the market tobuy northern products like baskets, shea butter and smocks, learned a few words of Fra Fra and marvelled at how people can live with the weather.Science Week is from Monday 22nd to Sunday 28th November but it was officially launched in Ghana today (Thursday 25th) at the VAG hall in Bolga. Myself and Stephen, the Upper East chairman of GAST, were charged with organising the whole operation and I am so glad it is all over. Without going into details, we have been bedevilled by lack of communication and total disregard of timekeeping. Nonetheless, 250 students paraded around the town this morning accompanied by a brass band carrying a twelve foot banner proclaiming the launch of National Science Week.“Halleluiah, Halleluiah...” the children sang at the top of their voices, singing in time to the brass band who clearly only knew Christian music and holding the Science Week banner aloft. “God created the world in six days, Halleluiah!”Cars, motorbikes and lorries were halted by the parade and traffic lights were ignored. We marched down the middle of the street, the children puzzlingly enthusiastic. I doubt they knew why they were marching. They missed school for the entire day along with their teachers. Two senior policemen on a motorbike stopped and complained that we were holding up the town without informing them and, presumably, paying for permission. By that stage we were an unstoppable force of noise, a river of waving, singing and dancing children.I only knew we needed a banner yesterday so, given the short notice, a teacher painted it last night but was so tired he couldn’t teach his classes this morning. He also wrote the date wrong on the banner so a piece of paper was pinned in front of the wrong number, clearly drawing attention to the fact that the tired painter made a mistake.We invited the regional minister but he sent a representative. We invited the regional director for education but she sent a representative. We invited the director of the Environmental Health Agency but he sent a representative. The representatives read speeches. The president of GAST read a speech. Some of the children sat in the hall but most stayed outside talking, playing and wasting their time.What happened at the GAST launch of Science Week was less important than the fact that it just happened. There is a hierarchy of events that associations can undertake. We had three radio interviews, a parade, TV coverage and the representatives of locally important dignitaries making speeches. A lesser event might just have a radio announcement and a minor keynote speaker. A greater event might have included a cultural performance, a powerpoint presentation and the presence of the regional minister.There is an association for maths teachers, French teachers, polytechnic teachers, headteachers, GES employees, Ministry of Food and Agriculture employees, bus drivers, politicians, policemen, firemen, refuse collectors and hairdressers. They appear to be far more active than similar unions and associations are in the UK, particularly when it comes to staging events such as the jamboree we had today.The extended family plays a central role in Ghanaian life. Distant cousins, uncles and children have licence to stay in your house for as long as they like, eat whatever they like and expect money for whatever they like. Families can be a real burden. Most families seem to contain a scrounging old uncle or a lazy good-for-nothing cousin. These individuals are then supported by the richer and usually more hard-working members of the family. Every so often, usually for a funeral, the whole extended family must come together. Funerals are massive events. There are radio announcements, newspaper entries, cultural displays, banners, T-shirts, parades through town and speakers from amongst the invited dignitaries who are grandly titled‘chief mourners’. The budget for the whole family can be blown on these events. It demonstrates how important the family is.As Ghana lurches forward into the twenty-first century, commentators bemoan the breakdown of the traditional African extended family. Children, they say, no longer respect their elders. Aged parents, they say, are no longer supported by their working offspring. For a culture built around the family, all sharing what they have, the individualism and consumerism of capitalism sits uneasily. Professional Ghanaians trying to better themselves can be made to feel really guilty by their extended family. Continual requests for support from sick aunts, layabout cousins and school aged children can grind you down. The yearning to be associated with a family that understands and supports instead of leeches may be part of the reason for the popularity of professional associations and unions.The national president of GAST is an old man with a ready smile, referred to as the father of the association. The former president, a bright eyed and passionate man, is referred to as the grandfather of the association– respect indeed. This week’s gathering of GAST executive was like a family occasion. Old friends embraced as they hadn’t seen each other for so long. Everyone is a brother or sister or uncle or mother. The president addressed his ‘children’ at the opening address. The language of the family is embedded in everything the association discusses. I felt myself caught up in the spirit of brotherhood. Whilst posing for a photograph, someone said they wanted the white man in the middle. Immediately, the man wearing the white GAST polo shirt moved to the middle leaving me and the association secretary, both wearing the blue GAST shirts, at the outside. My skin colour was not what my brothers and sisters within GAST were looking at – the GAST shirt, indicating my membership to the family, was considered more important and more noteworthy. It is the first time this has happened to mein Ghana.The problems of the extended family extend also to the unions and associations. Every union contains a scrounging uncle and a good-for-nothing cousin. There are many science teachers that are hard-working but far too many (the vast majority in fact) are lazy. Allowing them and even encouraging them to be members of GAST brings up their credibility and brings down the reputation of the association, the family of science teachers and the profession in general.The cycling Irish economist, Chris, was not entirely correct in his casual blame of unions for the lack of development in Ghana. Ghana is very different to the British Isles and operates within a very different society. The class wars of Europe are being fought differently in Ghana. The unions are not socialist bulwarks against the ruling classes but are more familial and exclusive clubs for professionals. The GAST constitution resembles rules for a British golf club. Perhaps Ghanaian unions and associations will evolve into something resembling guilds, where professional standards and guidelines are drawn up and regulated. Perhaps they will evolve into elite cliques, defending the privileges of the lazy built on the back of the defenceless poor.It is certainly interesting to compare the public sector workers in Ghana with their counterparts in the private sector. Small businesses, such as the ones owned by the band members, are bustling hives of activities. I sometimes sit in Kwesi’s electronics shop in the market and watch the procession of people diving in and out, bringing their faulty items and negotiating prices. Kwesi has recently invested in a new smart building with a tin roof and mosquito netting. The most dynamic business to be in at the moment is the mobile telecommunications industry. Whilst staying in the small roadside town of Savelugu recently, a giant MTN bandwagon swept into town to advertise its latest promotion. A team of twenty or so eager young workers leapt off the bus and quickly engaged town residents. Their industry and drive was in sharp contrast to the lethargy I see in most young teachers. If a fraction of that spirit was transferred to education, VSO wouldn’t be needed in Ghana.In the public sector, no one seems to do anything unless they are given some‘motivation’. The regional education office has a team of three typists. They sit all day at computers, kindly donated by an NGO, playing solitaire. As their job is to type documents, I went to them one day last term and asked for a document to be typed. They looked at me quizzically. After sometutting and head shaking, they sent me away and continued playing solitaire. I went to their superior to ask what the problem was. She told me that they would expect some small motivation especially as I am a white man. I had to pay them to do jobs they were already collecting a salary for... and they made loads of typing errors. Many teachers are paid for conducting ‘extra classes’. Often these are only needed because the teacher failed to turn up for regular classes he was collecting a salary for. The first time I heard a teacher talking about motivation to do some work, I naively thought he was talking about an intrinsic motivation to do a good job. Public sector workers will expect a motivation to attend a meeting or a conference. An NGO recently staged an event where they invited schools to bring their students and learn about Ghana’s new oil discovery. It was a good event with an interesting presentation. Veronica and I went to represent the regional director of education. As we had been invited, the NGO gave us an envelope containing ‘travel money’ of 100GHc. Public servants, from primary teachers to senior civil servants, expect such travel money and complain bitterly if it doesn’t appear. It has been suggested that such bonuses are there to supplement low salaries but, as with the outrageous private sector banker bonuses of New York and London, the higher your regular salary, the more bloated your bonus.Last month, the union for tertiary institution lecturers went on strike, closing universities and polytechnics across the country. Students protested, the media was in uproar and the government had to step in to intervene. This is not an unusual occurrence– universities are frequently forced to close over strike action. The president himself met with union leaders and was heavily criticised by the opposition for conceding too much to union demands.I was told this story by a Dutch friend near Cape Coast: Inherited from the British after independence, the small state railway ran from Accra to Kumasi and Cape Coast. Along the track were signal boxes, each one staffed by two men. Sadly, the railway fell into disrepair and the Accra to Cape Coast line was forced to close some time in the 1980s. Promises were made to reopen the railway but grass soon grew between the tracks, people set up houses and shops on the disused line. The signal box men, incredibly, continued turning up to man their crumbling signal boxes and continued receiving their salary. This situation continued until the new government in 2009 wanted to finally make these state employees redundant so negotiated with the state transport union and were forced to pay bloated redundancy packages. For over twenty years these state employees did, literally, nothing.The Ministry of Education Teachers’ Day programme printed the words of the Labour Solidarity Song:When the Union’s Inspiration throughThe workers’ blood shall runThere can be no power greaterAnywhere beneath the sunYet what force on earth is weakerThan the feeble strength of mineBut the Union makes us strongChorus:Solidarity forever (x3)For the Union makes us strongThey have taken untold millionsThat they never toiled to earnBut without our brain and muscleNot a single wheel would turnWe can break their naughty powerGain our freedom when we learnThat the Union makes us strongThe event was sponsored by MTN, Minute Maid orange juice, IPMC (Ghana’s top IT hardware supplier), Cowbell milk, Starkist canned tuna fish and Indomie instant noodles.Maybe Chris had a point after all.