Technical education hit hard after administrators, teachers strike

Administrators of Technical Universities in Ghana have joined lecturers for a mammoth strike on Friday.

The lecturers, members of the Technical Universities Teachers Association of Ghana (TUTAG), declared a sit-down strike on Tuesday, October 7, 2019, over poor condition of service following the conversion of Polytechnics to Technical Universities.

They want the government to include them in ongoing negotiations to improve working conditions for teachers in tertiary institutions.

But on Friday, October 18, 2019, the Technical University Administrators Association of Ghana (TUSAAG) also joined the industrial strike action of TUTAG after a meeting.

“We are joining TUTAG’s industrial strike action because our views regarding the migration of staff of technical universities to the Public University Salary Structure PUSS resonates with that of TUTAG, that indeed, government and its agencies have failed to fulfil their responsibilities to completely migrate us to the PUSS and conditions of service as applied,” TUSAAG said.

The action, according to TUSAAG president, Edem K. Honu, has been necessitated by the government’s failure to address the concerns of its members.

He said TUSAAG was not happy by alleged tactical delay strategies adopted by the National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE), Ministries of Education and Finance, the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) and the Controller and Accountant General’s Department (CAGD) on the migration of staff of technical universities to the Public Universities Salary Structure (PUSS) since 2018.

He indicated that several attempts by TUSAAG to meet with the NCTE, FWSC and CAGD for deliberation on concerns regarding the migration had proven futile.

Reporting in the Central Region, Joy News’ Richard Kojo Nyarko said the Cape Coast Technical University campus was virtually empty.

He said if the impasse was not resolved by Monday, technical education in the region would be brought to its knees.

Technical students have also appealed to the government to intervene, reports Richard on Top Story on Joy FM.