Freddie Blay (2nd right) presenting the cheque to Rev. Prof. John Frank Eshun
The Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) Foundation is supporting some staff of the Takoradi Technical University (TTU) to upgrade themselves.
Since its conversion from polytechnic to a full technical university, it has become necessary for some of the staff to upgrade themselves but financial issues hampered the training of such staff.
The university therefore, wrote to the GNPC Foundation to help the institution to upgrade some of its staff and the GNPC Foundation has responded to the request.
The Board Chairman of the GNPC, Freddie Blay, last Thursday presented a cheque of an undisclosed amount of money to sponsor 40 staff of the TTU to further their studies.
Mr. Blay said it was a pity that some staff of the university were downgraded after an assessment due to the conversion from polytechnic to technical university and said “we must help you upgrade.”
“We could not sponsor all the funding for the upgrading so we decided to give 60 per cent of the amount requested,” the Board Chairman said, adding “we would have loved to do more because TTU is within the enclave of the oil-producing region and must benefit from it.”
Mr. Blay said TTU being at the hub of Ghana’s oil and gas industry deserves every support from GNPC.
“You wanted to put up a Petroleum Centre which you have brought us a proposal and GNPC Board has positively considered that one as well,” he said, adding “Next year, GNPC is putting up the Petroleum Centre to enhance the petrochemical industry.”
The Executive Secretary of the GNPC Foundation, Dr. Dominic Eduah, said GNPC Foundation is determined to impact lives and the best way to do that was through education.
He said when the foundation received the request from the Takoradi Technical University, GNPC Foundation decided to assist.
He said since 2017, GNPC Foundation has awarded 5,852 scholarships to Ghanaian students across the country, adding “out of the number, TTU has gotten 395. This is very significant and it shows our commitment to TTU.”
The Vice-Chancellor of TTU, Rev. Prof. John Frank Eshun, thanked GNPC Foundation for the support to the university’s staff.
“We are grateful to the GNPC Foundation for responding to our request. I believe going forward, you are going to do more for us,” he said, adding “we are still in the process of upgrading our staff to meet the challenges that we are facing as a technical university.”
From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi