Cornelius Adablah, Chairman of the Board of Trustees for SLTF, Yaw Amoah, Director Finance and Administration, Mrs Gifty Appiasie, Chief Internal Auditor, Kofi Nkrumah, Head of Operation, Jupiter Nyamadi, Head of PRIS, Managers present (Evelyn, Rosemary and Kweku), Distinguished Members of the SLTF Team, Good Morning and welcome to the 2014 Annual Staff Durbar.
Today, I have the opportunity to put faces to some of the very hard working members of staff at the Zones . You have travelled far and near to be a part of this very useful annual ritual of the Trust Fund.
For the next three days we will be working together to develop strategies that should significantly improve our performance. For this we have very high expectations of you all.
- You will take responsibility for the performance of your respective Zones when you deliver your Zonal presentations, henceforth you will all be personally accountable for the results or otherwise of your Zones.
- You will be tasked not only to list the problems of the Fund, we all know so well, but also to be part of identifying the solutions.
- You will be expected to share Best practices that have worked well in your Zones in the area of recovery and disbursement and others will be required to drop worst practices.
- Finally, You will simply work hard and also build some networks during these two and a half days of working long hours.
As CEO, I am about doing six months with you now and within this period I have visited many of your Zones and schools under the Zones. I recall experiences with Hon. Yussif for the Northern Zone, to Adu Boahen for the Eastern/Volta Zones. I also recall vividly my time with Samuel in Sunyani and Sadiq/Francis for the Ashanti Region. As for the Zones in the Greater Accra environs we have met either through Kafui’s training or some other head office forum. So you see, I am very conversant with the situation on the ground. I know where our strengths are, and am also fully aware of our weakness too.
We are working hard to reduce the problems and to create a conducive workplace for all. I know our bosses are worried about our disbursement figures, and even more worried about the recoveries. It is worrying to know that, with such fine workforce we are only doing about 6% for disbursement and 18% for recoveries.
For me, it is very worrying that of the loan amounts due, we are only able to recover 18%. I see this as one of the biggest threat to our survival. However, I am very optimistic. I am optimistic because I know I have some of the finest soldiers on the battlefield and therefore together we will collect every penny disbursed.
We will enforce the legal provisions of our enabling Act to ensure that we improve recoveries significantly. I am thrilled by the challenge however with the amount of energy we all bring to the table. I trust WE CAN.
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, Coming together is the beginning. Keeping together is progress but surely working together is what will drive our success. Let’s continue to work together to deliver results we can all be proud of.
I am poised to steer the affairs of the Trust Fund with ambition, fairness and very high expectations of everyone of you. My open door policy still pertains and therefore I am open to discuss innovations that will deliver results.
We have a robust Research Unit and we will work closely with you all to put together data that will help us deliver informed change. Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen, I wish to entreat you all to support activities of the Research Unit by providing timely data when you are tasked to do so.
It is my pleasure once again to be part of this important stock taking exercise and I am eager to hear about the performance of your respective zones.
Thank you and enjoy the rest of the your time with us at Head office.
Before I take my seat I will like to thank the Team that put this event together so beautifully, Francisca, Rosemary, Owusu Antoh, and all the other Team members for their dedication to work . I also say “ayeeko” to Fred and the accounts team for their support.
Finally I can tell that our deliberations will yield the expected results and for that I say kudos.
