Samples of crystalline silicon and glow-discharge-deposited hydrogenated amorphous silicon were doped with gallium by low-energy (4-keV) ion implantation. X-ray photoemission spectroscopy was used to study the chemical-bonding states of the Ga. From Ga 3d core-level studies, we found that elementary interstitial, threefold-coordinated, and fourfold-coordinated Ga coexist in the ion-implanted and annealed amorphous silicon network. The percentage of activated threefold- and fourfold-coordinated Ga atoms is found to increase with increasing annealing temperature, prior to crystallization. The energy released by the amorphous silicon lattice upon annealing contributes to the activation of the gallium from the elementary state to the threefold- or fourfold-coordinated state. No evidence of Ga-H bond formation is found. The percentage of fourfold-coordinated Ga, which we call the doping efficiency, ranges from 5% to 10%, depending upon the thermal treatment.