The University of Ghana branch of the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG-UG) is demanding the resignation of the Director-General of the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC), Professor Ahmed Jinapor Abdulai, and his Deputy, Prof. Augustine Ocloo, by Saturday, January 31 for abuse of powers.
According to UTAG-UG, the administration of the two has led to GTEC veering off its core mandate and failing to uphold its statutory expectations.
“Instead of executing its core mandate, the Commission has been reduced to tangential and sometimes frivolous actions, such as chasing people with ‘fake degrees’ while neglecting the fundamental issues affecting tertiary education in Ghana,” UTAG-UG said in a press release on Monday, January 19.
It insisted that GTEC has lost its way under Prof Jinapor and “is now being used to settle scores”.
“Instead of promoting good governance in public tertiary education institutions, it engages in actions that undermine it.
“For instance, under what legal mandate did GTEC remove the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast, Prof. Johnson Nyarko Boampong? If GTEC claims regulatory authority, which specific provision in Act 1023 empowers such an intervention?”
It lamented that under the current administration of GTEC, Governing Councils of all public tertiary institutions have been rendered “useless” and “powerless” and Vice Chancellors reduced to “toothless bulldogs, nonentities and person non grata on their various campuses”.
UTAG-UG warns that failure by the two to resign before the set date will result in a petition to the Chief of Staff for their removal followed by an industrial action if necessary.