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The Ghana Medical Association (GMA) has expressed grave concern about the continued distortions in the salary of its members since they were migrated onto the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS). It said the distortions had also resulted in some of the doctors getting salaries lower than the predetermined salaries. The GMA is also not happy that most of its members have not been paid their salary arrears since February, this year. At a press conference at the end of the association�s national executive council meeting held in Koforidua yesterday, the GMA called on the Controller and Accountant-General�s Department (CAGD) and the government to address the issues once and for all. The President of the GMA, Dr Kwabena Opoku-Adusei, who read the press statement, said it looked as if it was a deliberate attempt by the government, the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) or the CAGD to deny doctors their due and called for an immediate resolution of the problems. Giving details of the problems, Dr Opoku-Adusei, flanked by the secretary of the association, Dr Frank Serebour, and other executive members, said since the migration of doctors onto the SSSS in December, 2011, the payment of their salaries had been riddled with many challenges. He stated that even though there had been an agreed timetable for the payment of salary arrears to public sector workers, actual payments had assumed an erratic posture thus raising concerns among doctors. According to him, while most doctors had not been paid their salary arrears since February, 2012, several others had even been receiving lower salaries than their predetermined monthly salaries. He said the association was at a loss as to the actual reasons behind such anomalies in the payment of salaries of the doctors. Dr Opoku-Adusei appealed to the Controller and Accountant-General�s Department to demonstrate its capability to immediately and satisfactorily address the concerns by the next payroll. On the dispute between the GMA and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission on the placements of medical superintendents and district directors of the Ghana Health Services (GHS) on the SSSS, he said the issue had not been referred to GHS Council for redress as stipulated in the National Labour Council�s ruling. Dr Opoku-Adusei stated that since the FWSC unilaterally migrated such category of doctors to the SSSS, the GMA would petition the NLC to cite the FWSC for contempt to ensure that the right thing was done. He, however, asked the Deputy Minister of Health to quickly resolve the problem surrounding the payment of the conversion differences to the doctors. With regard to remarks by the Minister of Health, Mr Alban Sumani Bagbin, that he (minister) would withdraw the certificates of doctors refusing posting to deprived areas, Dr Opoku-Edusei stated that it was only the medical schools which awarded the certificates that could withdraw them. He said the GMA was aware of the lack of medical officers and uneven distribution in the country which did not favour the deprived areas, especially the three regions in northern Ghana. To overcome such a challenge, Dr Opoku-Adusei said the association came up proposals to address the problem but, unfortunately, the government failed to respond to the proposal. Dr Opoku-Adusei also dwelled on the recent industrial action of junior doctors at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi in protest against what they described as a pathetic working conditions as a result of shortages of essential drugs, breakdown of equipment, as well as erratic water and electricity supply leading to avoidable deaths. He indicated that in the heat of the dispute, the Chairman of the Management Board of KATH, instead of ensuring that such problems were resolved, rather made unfounded, baseless and childish accusations that doctors at the hospital had been pilfering the drugs and that situation had created the shortages. Dr Opoku-Adusei said the GMA strongly agreed with the call by the junior doctors of the KATH for a better and competent management board to be instituted for the hospital to resolve the issues in order not to compromise the quality of care at the hospital.