National President of POTAG (Middle) addressing the press conference
Members of the Polytechnic Teachers Association of Ghana (POTAG) and the Teachers of Technical Universities in the country have vented their spleen on the National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE) for dissolving all the council of the technical universities.
According to the POTAG members, the move by the NCTE violates the Technical Universities Act, 2016.
They indicated that after the conversion of the polytechnics into technical universities, the Technical University Act (Act 922) vested the running of the institutions in the hands of the Polytechnic Council.
They started that Section 42(1) of Act 922 states “the Council of a Polytechnic converted into Technical University shall be an interim council which shall function for a period of not more than one year.”
“But the NCTE has dissolved all these council without constituting same to perform the function of ensuring the smooth transition of the various institutions,” they stressed.
They revealed that “But in what looks like a display of power, the NCTE, through it Executive Secretary, Prof Mohammed Salifu, has acted ultra vires, usurping the functions of the Council.”
“The behavior of Prof Salifu is making the various unions agitated and they are planning a huge demonstration against the unlawful act,” it said.
Addressing a press conference in Takoradi yesterday, the National President of POTAG, Emmanuel Agyeman, noted that the NCTE had written to all key officers of the various technical universities to make them interim officers, pending new appointments and advertisements.
“But it is not in their power to do so. The Act gives this power to the council of the various technical universities which NCTE has deliberately delayed in constituting,” he added.
He asserted that the NCTE, which has a hidden agenda, had resorted to deliberate delay to thwart the transition process.
“The association believes that the deliberate tactics of the NCTE is to secure the ambition of some of their cronies from the traditional universities to take up key positions in the newly converted technical universities,” he added.
The National POTAG President mentioned that the Minister of Education, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, never sought the view of POTAG as stakeholder in the matter.
“This has made the views of the minister on the matter skewed towards that of NCTE.”
“POTAG, as a matter of urgency, demands the immediate reconstitution of the Governing Council of the Technical Universities and Polytechnics.”
He also called on government to expedite action on the payment of the Book and Research Allowances for the 2016/2017 academic year.
“We appeal to the government to intervene to avoid any disruption in academic work on the various campuses,” he noted.
From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi