Re: The NDC Minority Statement On The University Of Education, Winneba Impasse

The NDC minority in Parliament on 29th March, 2019 issued a press statement in respect of the recent developments on the main campus of the University Of Education, Winneba (UEW).

According to them, they are deeply worried because the closure of the institution on 14th March, 2019 is detrimental to not only students but academic work as well.

I will for the purpose of clarity highlight each point they raised in their press release and deal with them one after the other.

Paragraph two of their statement reads and I quote" Our worry is further informed by the entrenched positions adopted by the University Council on the one hand and the University Teachers Association of Ghana(UTAG)-UEW local chapter and National who appear to have the support of the students of UEW on the other hand."

The statement by the NDC Minority in Parliament reminds me of two words" "selective dishonesty and unbriddled hypocrisy"*. It has never been in doubt that the NDC is a partisan political opportunists who are always in a hurry to score cheap political points by putting every single blame on government on any issue in the public. If the NDC had checked well, they would have known that the unlawful dismissal of some senior lecturers is the reason behind the impasse in UEW.

The question is, why should anybody in his reasonable mind make the assertion that the consistent interference of the NPP Government in the administration of our tertiary institutions is the cause of the academic unrest we witness in these institutions such as the current one in UEW and the previous one we saw in KNUST?

Isn’t it a notorious fact that the unrest we saw in KNUST was a result of the despicable abuse of students’ rights and unfair treatment coupled with brutalities visited on students by security men on the campus of KNUST? Where in this can we see consistent interference of the NPP Government?

In the NDC's own press release, they highlighted the chronology of events that led to the academic unrest in UEW. They began by pointing to the dismissal of some lecturers and went ahead to argue in line with logic as to why those lecturers shouldnt have been sacked.

If they were mindful of their own statement, they wouldn’t have concluded that the" NPP Government’s consistent interference in the administration of UEW is the cause of the turbulence we witnessed some few weeks ago.

How can the unlawful dismissal of senior lecturers to satisfy the whims and caprices of a vindictive VC which forced students to hit the streets be an issue of consistent interference of the NPP Government in the administration of UEW?

In their own statement, they called on the VC and the governing council chairman to resign for placing their own personal interests above the core interest of the University. The question we need to ask them is that, if an administrator in an institution places his personal interest above the interest of the organisation and there is chaos within the same organisation, should any Government in power be accused of interference or being responsible for same?

Today, they are calling on the VC and the Governing Council chairman to resign based on the following, (a) corruption (b)spiteful insolence (c) inability to resolve the current impasse in UEW.

If indeed the recent impasse in UEW is as result of the "consistent interference"of the NPP Government, then why are they calling on the governing council chairman and the VC to tender in their resignation as the surest way to bring peace in UEW?

When it was clear that the impasse in KNUST was as a result of the VC's autocratic posture they heavily" bashed " this government for being lethargic when the issue escalated into violent destruction of properties. They never asked the VC to resign in order to bring peace in KNUST because their interest was to score a political point.

# We need a credible and honest minority#

Dawda Eric (Equity)

UEW Alummus

30th March,2019