Part-payment on Earth?

At a ceremony at the Great Hall, KNUST,  Kumasi on Saturday, October 5, 2024, Ms Fuseina Fuseini, a teacher of the SDA Basic School at Madina, Accra, was declared the overall National Best Teacher for 2024. 

The saying/cliché, “the teacher’s reward is in heaven” is probably older than I am. It is told teachers to pacify them when they complain about their poor conditions of service/remunerations despite all their hard work and toil. Their low pay translates into poor pensions on their retirement.

I dare not say I have a living example in my house, for fear of upsetting the prevailing positive “domestic eco-system of peace!”

Chancellor Merkel

A quote with German attribution states;

“Teachers in Germany have the highest pay in the country. When judges, doctors and engineers asked the Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel for the same salary, she told them,

‘Can I compare you to those who taught you? I cannot put you on the same level as one who taught you!”

Can such a statement be made in Ghana about teachers by a President? In an earlier article in 2022, I stated as follows

Unexpected yams

Occasionally, it appears God drops a bit of the teacher’s reward here on earth as happened to my “Manager” last weekend. Unexpectedly, we were the beneficiaries of two sacks containing a total of over fifty yams and an impressive number of guinea fowls.

The young Lieutenant who delivered the parcel had been sent by his Commanding Officer in Tamale.

The parcel was from a former student of “Manager,” at the Armed Forces Secondary Technical School, Burma Camp, who is now a big Lieutenant-Colonel.

I am not sure though, if such earthly drops will be debited against the teacher’s total heavenly account.

This windfall of yams brought back memories.

“Ejisu-Eight”

As the Commanding Officer (now Commandant) of the Ghana Military Academy in the late 1990s, duty took me to Kumasi.

“Manager” accompanied me. From previous experience, I knew that on our return trip to Accra, given the chance, she would want us to stop at every point food appeared to buy yams, plantains, cocoyam, snails, nkontomire and any food item in sight, till my Command Land-Rover got full.

Not ready for this, I sternly declared, “Madame, there will be two stops for you to buy food. No more!”

Having decided Ejisu would be her first stop, she bought eight tubers of yam among others, which she started distributing from Koforidua. When we arrived home, she asked my driver and bodyguard to take one each of the three remaining tubers, leaving the last for us.

A sudden storm, however, resulted in my soldiers taking off with all three yams, leaving us with zero from the eight Ejisu yams.

Manager’s plan for my breakfast the next day, my favourite fried yam thus got scuttled. She promised to make up for dinner that evening. She would buy a tuber of yam in the afternoon after school.

While at a meeting that morning, I was told a soldier from Tamale had been sent by his commanding officer to see me. He was to deliver a parcel. I called Manager who was just leaving home for school.

She waited to collect the parcel. When I got home later that evening, she showed me a sack containing about 20 yams! From eight Ejisu-yams to-zero, to-20 Tamale-yams!

Incidentally, the commanding officer (now a retired General) was my student when he was a captain and me a lieutenant colonel in the early 1990s.

Discussion

A 36-year-old Kenyan teacher Peter Tabichi, who won the 2019 “Global Teacher Prize Award,” said

“Seeing my learners grow in knowledge, skills and confidence is my greatest joy in teaching. When they become resilient, creative and productive in society, I get a lot of satisfaction, for I act as their greatest destiny enabler and key that unlocks their potential in the most exciting manner.”

Following this achievement, President Uhuru Kenyatta donated $200,000 to the Kericho Secondary School where Peter Tabichi teaches, for the development of STEM.

Interestingly, while working on my laptop for this article on  August 17, 2022, I got a WhatsApp message from a lieutenant colonel, my former cadet.
“Good day, Sir, I hope the general is doing well.

Today marks 21 years of commissioning for Regular Career Course 41. As the CO-GMA (Commanding Officer, Ghana Military Academy), your leadership, nurturing and untiring efforts which made it all possible cannot be overlooked. May God continue to bless you and replenish you. Thank you. The Intake remains eternally grateful, Sir.”

Like Tabichi, my joy is to see my products grow into responsible citizens and be an improvement on my generation. When the second Force-Commander in Somalia, Ugandan, Maj-Gen Francis Okello proudly talked of his student days at the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College in the 1990s and introduced me at the AU HQ, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 2017 as “my teacher who made me what I am,” I was humbled and happy.

While a few teachers such as Peter Tabichi, my “Manager” and I have received part of our heavenly reward here on earth, the fact remains that, the majority of Ghanaian teachers have not!

For our decision-makers, please listen to Chancellor Merkel’s statement on teachers. We are all what we are because of teachers!

At a dance in the mid-1970s, the late musician Bob Cole appealed to the audience, saying “please help me now, when I need help most. Don’t wait till I die and give me a grand ‘befitting funeral’!”

It is gratifying knowing that Fuseina’s prize was a three-bedroom house costing GH¢500,000. So, how come similar houses cost five hundred thousand dollars?

Incidentally, the first runner-up for the Ghana 2024 National Best Teacher award went to Richard Kojo Adomako who teaches at the 4 Garrison Basic School  Kumasi. He won a pick-up vehicle.

Let us appreciate Ghanaian teachers here on earth like Germany and Finland have done and stop saying, “the teacher’s reward is in heaven!” from where nobody has returned to confirm the waiting reward.

Leadership, lead by EXAMPLE! Fellow Ghanaians, WAKE UP!