University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) on strike over book and research allowance? Ok, my take: It is sheer pity to see a whole university lecturers behaving like a factory floor labourers. Ive heard the UTAG president Dr. Samuel Ofori Bekoe saying they are ready to stay at home for 10 years if government does not pay their annual book and research allowance for the 2014 academic year. How l wish government would be bold to call their bluff and withhold their salaries. It beggars belief that these economic and education saboteurs should remain at home and still get paid. No where in the Western World will anyone embark on industrial action and still expect their pay packet. It is only in Ghana that people go on strike and get paid for the period. The government should remain resolute and introduce the National Research fund so that, only those whose research proposals are accepted will receive funding. If these lecturers need extra income, they must write books and sell on the open market and not depend on a monthly stipend from government. They are a drain on the national purse. There are more pressing needs of Ghanaians to be met by government. They make noise about research allowance and yet has nothing to show for. We have all been to the University and know that most of the lecturers do no such research, and have been recycling notes for the past 30 to 50yrs. I challenge UTAG to publish only 10 research work of their members for the whole world to see if indeed they deserve the allowances being fought for. They should tell us what changes have their researches brought to the nation, and the academic world. What has been the contribution of any UTAG research to this country? What are their empirical recommendations over the years? We are simply intellectually lazy. We possess vast resources but have no clue how to generate useful outcomes. Our professors are stuck with 19th century ideas, and with outmoded formats on university administration and can only think of perks and petty campus politics. What happened to the constructive use of intellectual faculties by university administrators to generate funds? Or is it because the brains there cannot find any market place for the research works they claim to be undertaking? Elsewhere in the world where university authorities are serious enough, revenue is generated through research works. They do this by practically collaborating with industry to design and develop almost everything a human can use. They do not rely on monthly allowance from government to fund their activities. UTAG members must be academically innovative enough to recognize the abundance of opportunities within their various campuses, through industry related commercial research and inventions as a way of augmenting what the poor tax payer gives them through government subventions and not the cheap so-called book and Research allowance, and yet be shamelessly resorting to strike action. We are in the 21st century. The world has moved on. University lecturers must not be in the news for such indiscipline reasons. Government has proposed Research fund, and l think it is the way to go. UTAG must take up the challenge to lead this country in revolutionary thinking in line with modern trends and not the same archaic methods that have failed us.
Posted on: Sat, 26 Jul 2014 13:22:42 +0000
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