I Won’t Fight Wa Poly Lecturers – Suspended Rector

The suspended Rector of the Wa Polytechnic, Professor Emmanuel Marfo-Owusu, has said he will not be drawn into any personal confrontation with lecturers of the institution.

The lecturers have served notice they will not allow the Rector access to the campus following allegations of financial mismanagement.

Professor Marfo-Owusu in a Citi News interview said his lawyers are advising him on his next move.

“I tried going [there] today, but my lawyer advised that if I don’t hear from the school that they have opened the place, I don’t have to go and struggle with them. I’ve left it with my lawyer to take up the action that will follow. And so in the course of the week, you will know the action that I will take,” he said.

Background

Prof. Owusu was suspended by a special committee comprising members of the Polytechnic Governing Council, who were tasked to investigate allegations of corruption levelled against him.

He has however filed a suit seeking to quash his suspension.

There was chaos at the Polytechnic on Monday when some staff locked out Professor Marfo-Owusu, and chased him out of the campus, accusing him of worker intimidation, among other things.

The Chairman of the Wa Polytechnic chapter of the Polytechnic Teachers Association of Ghana (POTAG), Mubash Bamie, speaking on behalf of teaching and non-teaching staff of the school, maintained that Prof. Owusu does not deserve to serve in that position given that he had been indicted in some corrupt deals.

Mr. Bamie said workers will repeat a similar action if the Rector returns, saying “if he comes we will block the roads again.”

The lecturers had earlier called on the Governing Council of the institution to cancel the induction ceremony for the Rector, who had been in office for nearly a year, but the induction went ahead.

They alleged that Professor Marfo-Owusu had procured a vehicle for himself at the cost of over five hundred thousand Ghana cedis without the approval of the Governing Council, and hence, should not be inducted.

They have further cited other financial irregularities as the basis for their call.

Blame Education Minister for my suspension

Prof. Emmanuel Marfo-Owusu, has accused the Minister of Education, Matthew Opoku Prempeh of unfair treatment over his suspension by the school’s governing council.

Addressing the media in Wa on Tuesday, Prof. Marfo-Owusu accused the Minister of being inconsiderate in the current impasse between him and staff of the polytechnic.

“I’m not happy with the Minister of Education’s conduct… When he said that he will take his decision anyway, I look at it like he is being bossy over me. There is no need to be bossy we are all professionals. He should have looked at it like the few minutes he could have given me to be able to appear the following week, would have yielded better results. You don’t take a decision when you haven’t heard from the other side; it is wrong because even in court they need to listen to the other version.”

“But you taking a decision tells me that because you in such a position, you think you can do whatever you want. In any case, if he likes to be bossy because he is a minister, and then he will look down on anybody who works under him it won’t augur well for the nation.”