UTAG wants commitment from VCG
The University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG), last Friday, wrote to the Vice Chancellors, Ghana (VCG) asking for a genuine commitment to pay the book and research allowance on behalf of the government.
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“We want a commitment to that effect and we expect that they would respond very soon,” the Vice-President of UTAG, Mr Alexander Dakubo Kakraba, told the Daily Graphic on Friday.
The letter to the VCG was submitted after members of the association on the various campuses had completed consultations with their rank and file.
According to Mr Kakraba, once the association got a clear commitment from the vice chancellors, it would call off the industrial action it had embarked on.
On August 1, 2013, lecturers in public universities began a strike to back their demand for the payment of all interim market premium arrears for 2012 and 2013 owed them by the government.
The lecturers also demanded the payment of their book allowances, usually paid at the beginning of an academic year, and the correction of an anomaly in the book allowance paid to polytechnic lecturers and university lecturers.
Although the government has released the market premium arrears of GH¢25 million to be paid to the lecturers, the association has been on strike because the issue of book allowance was pending.
Students of public universities who are expected to resume lectures next week are worried about the current situation.
UTAG in the first week of this month met with the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) and the National Security Coordinator on the amount of money to be paid as book and research allowance to the lecturers.
By Emmanuel Bonney/Daily Graphic/Ghana