Government has dismissed claims by the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG), that there is a freeze on the recruitment of lecturers into the country’s public tertiary institutions.
The President of UTAG, Harry Agbanu, had said the freeze on employment of lecturers by the public universities had created some inconvenience in the various institutions.
The universities have even threatened to cut down on the number of admissions in their schools.
“The vacancies that need to be filled by the University of Ghana, as regards all categories of staff stands at 1,200. Technical approval by Public Services Commission provided for 897 workers to be recruited. Surprisingly, financial clearance from the Ministry of Finance gives the university only 238 slots to be filled putting undue pressure on the few lecturers available,” he said at a press conference earlier this week.
However, according to the Education Ministry, the claims from UTAG were untrue as some teaching staff had been approved for employment into the universities.
“There is no ban on recruitment because we are aware that approval has been given for some 1, 018 teaching and non-teaching staff for the tertiary staff.
This number is the exact number requested by the tertiary and non-teaching staff through the NCTE, the Public Relations officer of the Ministry of Education, Francis Gbadago told Citi News.
He added that, tertiary institutions that needed more staff were free to make requests but had to go through the right processes for approval.
“If the Universities need additional staff to be recruited, it’s a very simple issue. They need to go through the due process by submitting their request through the National Council for Tertiary Education and it will be worked on for approval,” he said.
“Reducing the intake for the institutions as suggested by UTAG is not an option because we have given them the opportunity to recruit more lecturers if they deem it fit; but then it must go through the due process. They must request it through the NCTE and when it gets to us, we’ll forward it to the Ministry of Finance for approval.”
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