He observed that the continuous politicization of the work of civil servants and local government staff was threatening effective service delivery. Dr Arthur gave the advice during a panel discussion at the Civil and Local Government Staff Association, Ghana (CLOGSAG) Symposium on Tuesday on the theme: “Colloquium on Implications of the Supreme Court Ruling on Political Neutrality in the Civil and Local Government Services.”

He said: “You could belong to any political party but are you professional at your work place? We still have local government staff taking photographs of various official documents in their offices and sending to their political halls to take to radio stations. That kind of thing is not professional

“Why do you sit in an office because you belong to an area maybe records section or HR and when anything comes before you, you take your phone and take it to social media, that is something that we need to avoid,” he advised.

Nana Oye Lithur, a former Minster of Gender, Children and Social Protection, said public servants were required to work in a politically neutral manner and be very impartial in conducting government business.

She called for disciplinary action by the civil and local government service against those who flaunt the laws, which could help bring sanity at the work places. Nana Oye Lithur said a public servant could not participate overtly in political activities, however, civil servants over the decades had displayed their political affiliations openly being in party t-shirts, and other party paraphernalia.

“In Kenya they have legislation to govern this whole process that is the Public Officer Ethics Act that provides for political neutrality and civil servants cannot act in the interest of political parties, they also have the leadership and integrity act that prohibits public officers from engaging in activities of political parties.

“They also went to court in 2015 and they said that this limitation of the rights to enjoyment of political rights as set out in their elections act was not reasonable, so for instance their court came up with a provision that if you want to stand for elections then resign seven months before,” she said.

Nana Oye Lithur said the United Kingdom, China, Germany and other jurisdictions had addressed the issue and that Ghana could also find ways to address the subject reference to the Supreme Court interpretation. 

Nana Agyekum Dwamena, the Head of Civil Service, reminded workers that they were mandated to assist government to achieve its vision through the collaboration of all sectors of the Public Service.

He called on them to be loyal, selfless, neutral, objective and trustworthy to assist the government in power to accelerate national progress.  Dr Kwaku Ofosu-Adarkwa, a former Chief Director, Ministry of Communications reminded workers of their service to the citizenry rather than their political interest to help the growth of the country.