CBMP Analytical Report Part 1 - Transparency and Accountability ...

exacerbated by the fact that teachers are usually few and there is no possibility of
allocating another teacher to attend to that class on their behalf.
3.2.3 Mode of Access to Salaries
The study found out that there are two main ways in which teachers get their salaries.
Many teachers receive their salaries through Cash (79.4%)delivered at their school
while others access their salaries using Malswitch Cards at the Banks (20.6%). The
respondents explained that the two systems have their own advantages and
disadvantages, with all disadvantages leading to salary delays and affecting delivery of
quality teaching service at primary school level.
a. The Cash System
Teachers have traditionally been getting their pay through cash, mostly delivered at
their schools. A close look at the Cash System, the study found out that generally the
processes of verifying the Pay-Roll between the District Education Management
(DEM) and the Education Division Management (EDM) takes longer than expected.
Interviews with various district Education Management officials show that the
process takes more than 10 days on average, while the Pay-Roll from Treasury
reaches the District Office on the 18 th of the Month (on average). Thus, the
verification exercise completes usually on or after the official pay day of the salaries.
This being the case, it affects the time of delivery of salaries to various zones. On the
other hand, once the salaries have been delivered to the zones, it takes one day (87%)
for the Zone Officials to communicate with head teachers of various schools to come
and collect the money for their respective schools. This adds another day before the
teachers can access the pay. Better though is that once the head teachers get the pay,
they distribute it to fellow teachers the same day (97%), except for those teachers that
do not reside at the school and there is no contact on that day. Thus the general delay
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