10/3/2025
The Ministry of Health has assured the Junior Doctors’ Association and protesting nurses, and midwives that steps are being taken to resolve delays in the payment of salary arrears.
The assurance follows a planned nationwide withdrawal of services declared by the Junior Doctors’ Association of Ghana (JDA-GH), effective Tuesday, October 7, 2025, over months of unpaid salaries, stalled postings, and what they describe as persistent unfair treatment.
This announcement comes on the heels of a demonstration by a coalition of unpaid nurses and midwives on Thursday, October 2, demanding payment of salary arrears.
Ghana’s public hospitals are teetering on the edge of a major crisis after the Ministry of Health promised to clear massive salary arrears owed to thousands of frontline workers. This eleventh-hour assurance comes just as junior doctors threatened a total withdrawal of services, following a highly charged street demonstration by unpaid nurses.
The Junior Doctors' Association of Ghana (JDA-GH) issued a strike directive: pull outpatient services starting next Tuesday, October 7, and then halt emergency care three days later. They claim over 200 junior doctors have worked up to 14 months with nothing but dust in their pockets, while hundreds more await postings that are 16 months overdue (Per JDA-GH statement, October 2, 2025).
But you can’t ignore the thousands of nurses and midwives. Just yesterday, the Coalition of Unpaid Nurses and Midwives stormed Accra, demanding nearly 10 months of pay. Imagine working a 12-hour shift, tasting that metallic hospital air and knowing you can’t even afford the trotro home; that is their reality.
Ministry of Health spokesperson Tony Goodman assured the public the government is working with the Finance Ministry to resolve the "mix-up." He blamed the delays on a past rush to recruit staff without securing proper financial clearance first, a classic bureaucratic shuffle.
Anyway, Health Minister Kwabena Mintah Akandoh acknowledged the debt, stating his administration “inherited 13,500 of you recruited without any financial provision,” and promised a final deadline for payment after consultation with the Finance Minister (Per MyJoyOnline, October 2, 2025). Of that number, the Minister claims 8,000 have been enrolled, but the remaining 6,500 nurses and hundreds of doctors are still waiting for their first kobo.
The government has averted a total shutdown for now, but its word is already stretched thin. Will the promises hold, or is the health sector just weeks away from a national collapse?
Source: https://citinewsroom.com/2025/10/health-ministry-assures-junior-doctors-nurses-of-salary-arrears-payment/