To sell biscuits and drinks at the school where I teach

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• Lotus Flower    Aug 1, 2021

  Re: "As a newly posted teacher, I was thinking I might receive my salary... but that is not so..."
  
  This seems to be a common issue in Ghana. I wonder what the labor laws are there? I mean, I've heard of this from several people in your country even before the pandemic, that seemingly reputable schools and other organizations fail to pay their employees faithfully each month, sometimes month after month, and then people have to quit their job because they're spending what little money they had saved or borrowed before on transportation to and from work and on food during lunch break if there's no refrigerator at work and if they don't live close enough to work to be able to go home for lunch. Obviously, nobody can afford to keep doing that indefinitely. People have to get paid for the work they do, but many Ghanaian employers apparently just do not pay reliably. Unless you know you're signing up for a volunteer job, someone agreeing to pay you for your work but then not paying you is a form of slavery. Employers who do that should be ashamed, at the very least, and should be held legally accountable, IMHO, especially since there seem to be no governmental funding programs to be able to apply for survival assistance, and oftentimes the family of the employee is in the same or worse situation and can't be relied upon for help because they can't help with what they don't have, themselves.
  
  I'm sure that your lender (Craig) understands that it's difficult for you to repay your loan on time, as intended. Please just do the best that you can to pay at least a little something on each installment payment-due date (or within the ten-day grace-period that follows that date, keeping in mind that payment dates and times are according the U.S. Eastern Time-Zone), so that the system wouldn't automatically report you to a credit-reporting bureau in your country, which gets done automatically according to algorithms programmed into the system... when a loan is fully paid, and as long as there are no technical glitches [which always should be reported through the HELP page in your account], the system also then automatically would send a report that the loan has been paid in full). I wish that I had unlimited funds as I would help you and everyone in your same boat to survive and also to have enough to hire a good labor-law attorney to take the deadbeat employers to court to get you every cedi they owe you, plus penalty damages for the suffering they cause! At least when this life is over, if not before, they will have to answer to God for their shameful behavior!!
  
  You are in my prayers.

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  • Christian    Aug 2, 2021

    Hello Laurie,
    
    Re: " This seems to be a common issue in Ghana. I wonder what the labor laws are there?" ….. You are perfectly right, my sister. The labor laws are only in our books, they only work for the rich in society. From 1984 when I was in basic school till today, newly posted teachers go through this shameful and hardship thing. I have even heard several news of some of these newly posted teachers who were so frustrated about this type of system and have committed suicide. This is the type of system/nation we are living in.
    Currently, I'm doing a community work in the western region of Ghana, a cocoa growing communities, a well fertile rain forest land area, and it would surprise you how companies, governmental agencies have bought bags of cocoa from these poor rural farmers for about year or more and are not paying these farmers. Some of these farmers have deplorable living conditions and this is how our institutions are treating them. Some of them who have taken loans from rural banks, savings & loans companies and bought fertilizers and agrochemicals are more frustrated. The list goes on and on and on, my sister. Sometimes person responsible for these things intentionally created these problems so as to extort money from the suffering poor victims. I can only wish them God's judgement one day.
    
    The day all of us in developing countries would notice that INTEGRITY is the only difference between developed and the developing nations, that day things would start to change for the better.
    
    Thank you, always grateful to you for your care and insightful writings on these issues. God richly bless you.
    
    Angela, I wish you well. You can contact me if you so wish. May be I may be of any assistance.

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    • Angela    Aug 8, 2021

      Hi , dear thank you so much for your comment. This my contact 0549786604
      Or you can send me your contact too.

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