Pay delay may take 4 months

The National National

THE PNG Teachers Association says it may take up to four months to put back on the payroll the 11,011 teachers currently not being paid.
Association general secretary Ugwalubu Mowana blamed the delay in their resumption of duty forms reaching the pay office in Waigani.
Mowana said it was totally unfair on the teachers who had filled in the forms at the start of term one and had started working. The forms go through the provincial education offices which then submit them to Waigani. Mowana said he was concerned about the teachers not being paid since last week.
Teaching Service Commission chairman Baran Sori told The National that it had given teachers up to the seventh pay day – the fortnight ending Wednesday last week – to fill in and submit their resumption of duty summary sheet forms to the Education Department in Port Moresby.
Sori said the 11,011 teachers’ forms were yet to be received, thus the “auto suspension” from the payroll. The 11,000 include teachers who:

  • Did not resume duties at the start of term one in late January and thus had not filled in the forms;
  • Had resumed duties but had not filled in the forms;
  • Had filled in the forms which are yet to reach the pay office in Waigani.

“Automated suspension is when the system suspends teachers when their resumption of duty is not registered in the system,” he said. “It is a normal process that (happens) around this time of the year.”
The biggest number of teachers affected are in East Sepik (1042), Madang (1112), Morobe (1439), Eastern Highlands (984), Western Highlands (906) and Bougainville (511).
Sori urged the provincial education divisions to immediately send the teachers’ forms to the payroll division of the Education Department in Port Moresby. There are more than 56,000 teachers in the country.