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Rescue the perishing, care for the dying (Part 2)
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The previous article discussed the issue of casual workers scattered all over the country who have been unjustly consigned to the status of “permanently temporary” employees against all conventions of fair employment practice. According to Ghana’s Constitution and the Conventions of the International Labour Organisation, (ILO),which Ghana has ratified, no worker should be deemed to be casual after working continuously for six months but that has remained just a mere rhetoric.
People have worked for periods ranging from 10 to 20 years and are considered and treated casual labourers, an anomaly reported to be more widespread within public health institutions across the country. What is worse, these employees work for chicken feed, despite all their toil, and in conditions far from conducive. Worst of all, the Inspectorate Department of the Ministry of Employment and Labour that should monitor these things and serve justice, appears to be either nonchalant or plainly irrelevant.
In this article, the emphasis is on the abuse of women’s rights in the workplace. I would not talk about sexual harassment because even though it is prevalent, it is so subtle that it has assumed the status of normalcy without being seen for what it really is. Since Adam, some Ghanaian men, especially those in management positions, have seduced their female subordinates and pressurised them to succumb to their advances or face their wrath. Some have yielded out of fear of losing their jobs and have been left scarred for life. Yet, out of shame, and for fear that their story might be repudiated, they keep it under wraps while suffering in silence.
You see, men in Western countries cannot even pass suggestive comments without serious consequences. The Governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, lost his very lucrative job because of this. His younger brother, Chris Cuomo, one of the best journalists at CNN, who was found to have attempted to offer some advice to his brother’s staffers on how to wriggle his way out of trouble, also lost his job. The network fired him. In Africa, and for that matter, Ghana, it has become and remained normal and harmless. Consequently, the practice persists unabated, and offenders do not face any sanctions. Who will rescue the perishing? Who will care for the dying?
Another area of abuse concerns maternity leave, that is, the period granted a female worker by law to be absent from work before and after childbirth. Ghana has ratified the ILO Maternity Protection Convention, 1952, (No. 103) and has a legislation that stipulates 12 weeks paid maternity leave which works up to three months. Some groups, including the Ghana Medical Association, have advocated six months.
That is the ideal thing to do but there is a big problem. The elders would tell you:“Ko kompow’annya a, 3na treeee?” which loosely translates to: “If you did not get mere drops, how can you get a flow?” Some employers do not so much as educate their workers on their bill of rights, talk less of paying maternity leave. That is to say, even the mandatory 12 weeks are not given, not to mention doubling the period to six months as has been proposed in some quarters. In fact, some bosses keep beneficiaries in the dark about the requirement of the law and take advantage of their ignorance.
Paid maternity leave must not be allowed to be toyed with. Medical experts explain that conceiving a baby and having one, changes a woman’s body in ways that are hard to predict, making her moody, exhausted, restless, and ultimately depressed, if care is not taken. Unfortunately, employers do not consider the gravity of this concern and factor it into their plan as they design their benefit packages for their female employees if they do it at all.
Apart from the crime such employers are committing by denying women of such rights, they are also losing indirectly as giving that paid maternity leave would afford nursing mothers many benefits which would indirectly inure to the good of their companies by way of higher productivity.
In the first place, it would enable the women to exclusively breastfeed their babies which medical experts recommend as being far healthier and better than tinned infant formula. That would have a positive impact on the health of both mother and baby as it would serve to prevent post-partum depression which is common among women. It is estimated that about one in every eight women is affected.
A healthy mother will not absent herself from work unnecessarily and be in the right frame of mind to take care of her baby. Denying her sufficient time for maternity leave is bad enough, how worse does it get with none at all? Do such employers have any bowels of compassion at all? What do they think of a nursing mother without the benefit of family support leaving her tiny three-month old infant in the care of a stranger at a nursing home when she has not sufficiently bonded with her baby, but still has to resume work?
Some employers think they are even being considerate when they offer you a fraction of the stipulated leave period. They think it is a favour they are doing, especially if the workers are ignorant of their rights. Some are aware of the existence of the provision but do not know the details and so, anything goes.
In some cases, there is ample evidence that the new mother needs additional time to rest due to complications in delivery requiring surgical operation, and, therefore, additional days. But some callous employers deny the woman such medical rest even though the law provides that she should be given two additional weeks to the 12 weeks due her as her normal maternity leave.
What about the requirement that an hour a day should be given the new mother to nurse her baby? I will turn the earlier Akan proverb and say: “Treeeempo antre mu a, na ko ko?” meaning: “If a flow does not suffice, what good would mere drops do?”The boss does not even want to give you the real deal, that is, the 12 weeks maternity leave, how much less an hour a day to nurse your baby? In some instances, some employers have even been so mean as to punish pregnant women with dismissal even though they have genuine reasons for pre-natal and post-natal bed rest. And this is done without recourse to the laid down procedure for termination of employment spelt out in Section 15 of the Labour Act.
What is Parliament championing for women? The empty platitudes must stop. The rhetoric will not help. Last month, the MP for Nadowli-Kaleo, Mr. Anthony Suumah Mwinkaara, brought the attention of parliament to the unfair treatment of people unjustly classified and treated as casual workers even though they have long exceeded the maximum six months tenure stipulated for such staff.
The issue of women’s rights is another problem that this column is placing on the radar for consideration by parliament. It is long overdue for Ghanaian women to be treated with some dignity. Even if the House would not pass legislation to mandate a six-month paid maternity leave, it must pass a law to criminalise refusal to comply with the existing requirement of 12 weeks.
Besides, the House can propose a graduated scheme that provides for a percentage of the regular salary after the first 12 weeks if additional leave days are added. That could be a good compromise before the period may be formally extended to the ideal six months. Rescue the perishing, care for the dying! And remember, mothers cannot wait.
Contact: teepeejubilee@yahoo.co.uk
By Tony Prempeh
There is a culture that permeates all aspects of leadership in the advanced countries which I believe has contributed to the success in all aspects of their national lives. Citizens strive to excel so that they will not find themselves in a situation where they would have failed, to necessitate a decision to resign.
Countries where failure is frowned upon, it pushes the citizens to strive for success. In our part of the world, failure and mediocrity has become an accepted norm and therefore, there is no shame in failing in a particular position of leadership.
A head of an organisation mismanages the place and he does not see the need for him to resign. The appointing authority does not also see the need to sack him and so the merry go round continues.
It becomes friends and family as usual and if care is not taken, the rest of the world will leave us far, far behind.
The practice of resignation in parts of the world for failure in some parts of the world has to be institutionalised in our country too. It encourages the principle of accountability which is good for any organisation, sector of an economy or a country.
It promotes good governance, a necessary ingredient in the growth of the economy of any country.
When this practice becomes a culture, every individual, privileged to hold a position of trust, gives his or her full attention to the job assigned him or her, to ensure that objectives are achieved.
This trickles down to every individual down the chain of command and there are no rooms for errors.
That is how efficient systems are built over time and this is the difference between advanced nations and third world countries.
Where systems are designed such that people take responsibility for things that go wrong under their supervision or ultimate responsibility, there is evidence of development.
There are a few people that I admire in Ghana as far as this culture of resignation based on principled stance. One of them is the late Mrs Emma Mitchell. She was a cabinet member but chose to resign after the confrontation between late President Jerry Rawlings and late Vice President Kow Akaah.
She was not prepared to be part of a cabinet which was lying to the general public that Rawlings did not assault Akaah.
She was of the conviction that telling the truth is more honourable than telling lies and that if she was bound by confidentiality oaths to tell a lie, then she would resign and she did exactly that.
That is how we build a culture of truth and accountability. We have people in positions who have not lived up to expectation but are still holding on to their positions not prepared to let go of it.
This is a clear case of display of selfishness, trying to be a Boss instead of a Servant to serve the people, which leadership is all about.
The ineffectiveness of some leaders, often result in waste of resources which could have been channeled to other sectors of the economy which could have been more productive. A culture of voluntary resignation must be advocated for by all stakeholders, especially the CSOs, traditional leaders and the clergy.
This is the only way the needed growth in every sector of our national life would manifest.
Presidents, Prime Ministers, heads of reputable organisations have voluntarily resigned by taking ultimate responsibility and it is about time, we started seeing it manifest in our country.
The people in charge of our sports especially our soccer, can initiate this long desired culture and resign in view of the embarrassment witnessed from the defeat of the Black Stars by Gambia. God bless.
BY LAUD KISS-MENSAH
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THE QUR’AN FORBIDS RELIGIOUS PROVOCATION
There is a remarkable verse in the Qur’an which every Muslim preacher should memorise.
Allah says:
“And do not insult those they invoke besides Allah, lest they insult Allah in hostility without knowledge.” (Qur’an 6:108).
Think about this carefully.
Allah knows that the unbelievers worship false gods.
Yet Allah tells Muslims: Do not insult their objects of worship.
Why?
Because your speech may provoke an even greater offence.
This establishes a profound principle:
A Muslim must not fight religious provocation with religious provocation.
If someone insults what we hold sacred, we do not respond by insulting what they hold sacred.
If someone attacks Islam, we defend Islam with knowledge.
If someone misrepresents Muhammad (pbuh), we explain who is Muhammad to him.
If someone lies about Islam, we answer with truth and knowledge.
We do not allow another person’s bad behaviour to dictate our own morality.
LOOK AT MUHAMMAD (PBUH) — HE WAS INSULTED BEFORE WE WERE
Servant of Allah,
Sometimes we speak as though the Prophet (pbuh) lived in a world where everyone respected him.
No.
He was mocked and insulted. Quran 37:36, Quran 15:6
He was called a liar, magician, and a mad man. Quran 51:52, Quran 17:47
He was ridiculed. Quran 6:10
His followers were tortured, and some were killed. Quran 85:8-10
He himself was persecuted, leading to his migration to Madina.
Yet he remained the Messenger of Allah.
Allah said:
“Indeed, we know that your heart is distressed by what they say.” (Qur’an 15:97)
Allah acknowledged the Prophet’s pain.
Islam does not say that insults do not hurt. They hurt.
But the question is: What do you do with the pain?
THE DAY OF TA’IF: WHEN THE PROPHET (PBUH) COULD HAVE CHOSEN
REVENGE
One of the most powerful examples is the journey of the Prophet (pbuh) to Ta’if.
He went seeking support for his message.
Instead, the people rejected him and incited their children and others against him.
He was chased.
He was insulted.
He was struck with stones until his feet bled.
He was physically and emotionally exhausted.
Then the Angel of the Mountains came to him.
The two angels offered to crush the people of Ta’if between the mountains.
The Prophet (pbuh) could have said: “Do it.”
But he did not.
Instead, he hoped that Allah would bring from their descendants people who would worship Him.
This account is recorded in the authentic hadith literature, including Sahih Muslim (Muslim, 1795).
What a lesson!
The Prophet (pbuh) had suffered injustice.
But he did not turn his pain into indiscriminate revenge.
He saw beyond the offender.
He saw the possibility of tomorrow.
And this is one of the greatest characteristics of prophetic leadership:
The Prophet (pbuh) did not merely ask, “What punishment does this person deserve?”
He also asked, in effect: “What can this person become?”
THE PROPHET IN MADINAH: LEADER OF A DIVERSE SOCIETY
When Muhammad (pbuh) migrated to Madinah, he did not enter an empty city.
Madinah contained different communities, including Muslims and Jews, and there were also Christians who interacted with the Muslim community.
The Prophet became the political and communal leader of Madinah.
The Sahifah (A Covenant) of Madinah, preserved in the early sīrah (Prophet’s biography) tradition, established arrangements concerning mutual obligations, security, justice and relations among the communities of the city.
This is important:
The Prophet did not build Madinah by teaching Muslims to hate everyone who was not Muslim.
He built a society governed by covenant, responsibility and justice.
Allah says:
“Allah does not forbid you from being kind and just to those who have neither fought you because of your religion nor driven you from your homes. Indeed, Allah loves those who act justly.” (Qur’an 60:8)
This is not weakness.
This is Islam.
THE PROPHET DEALT WITH JEWS IN MADINAH
‘A’ishah (Wife of the Prophet) narrated that the Prophet (pbuh) bought food from a Jewish man on credit and gave him his iron armour as collateral.
“The Prophet purchased food from a Jew on credit and mortgaged his iron armour to him.” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 2068)
Think about it.
This was Muhammad.
The Messenger of Allah.
Yet he conducted lawful commercial dealings with a Jewish citizen.
He did not say: “He is not a Muslim, therefore I cannot deal with him.”
No.
Islam gave him a relationship governed by justice and trust.
Jabir رضيهللاعنه narrated:
“A funeral procession passed before us and the Prophet (pbuh) stood up, and we stood with him. We said, ‘O Messenger of Allah, it is the funeral of a Jew.’ He said: ‘When you see a funeral procession, stand.’” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 1311)
Another narration records his response: “Is it not a soul?” (Sahih al-Bukhari, 1312–1313)
What kind of heart did Muhammad (pbuh) possess?
A heart that recognised human dignity even in death.
THE PROPHET AND THE CHRISTIANS OF NAJRAN
The Prophet also received the Christian delegation of Najran.
They disagreed with him theologically.
Yet when they requested a trustworthy person, he did not choose someone because of hatred.
He selected Abu ‘Ubaydah ibn al-Jarrah.
The Prophet said:
“I shall send with you a man who is truly trustworthy.”
He then appointed Abu ‘Ubaydah.
This is authentically reported in Sahih al-Bukhari 4380–4381.
Notice something profound:
The Prophet could disagree with people without becoming dishonest toward them.
That is the standard we need today.
The author is the chief Imam of Katamanso Municipal and Certified Counsellor and Governance Expert.
