PRESS CONFERENCE OF THE PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES STUDENTS’ ASSOCIATION OF GHANA (PUSAG), ON THE ISSUE OF GETFUND, UNIVERSITY CHARTER AND THE IMPOSITION OF THE 25% CORPORATE TAX, FOLLOWING THE RESPONSE FROM THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT TO OUR PETITION SENT TO THE GOVERNMENT ON 6TH AUGUST 2014. Good morning ladies and gentlemen from the media. We thank you for honoring our invitation today to help us disseminate our displeasure as citizens of this country to the heads of authority and the entire nation as a whole. We the members of Private Universities Students’ Association of Ghana (PUSAG) are dismayed by the response of government and the recommendations of the Council of Tertiary Education on our petition on issues raised in a petition sent on the 6th of August 2014 copied to all the stakeholders concerned. The petition was addressed to the President of the Republic of Ghana and copied to the Minister for Education, the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education and selected political parties. Honorable Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa the Deputy Minister in charge of tertiary received the petition on behalf of the President and promised to get back to us within a week. This never happened until another copy was sent to the office of the President by ourselves. Below were the issues raised in our petition: GETFUND UNIVERSITY CHARTER AND AFFILIATION 25% CORPORATE TAX GETFUND is a public trust set up to provide funding to supplement government effort for the provision of educational infrastructure and facilities within the public sector from the pre-tertiary to the tertiary level. In essence, private university students and their families are providing financial support for public universities. In this light, we are passionately appealing that the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFUND) should allocate resources to the development of private universities students as it used to be in the past. PUSAG is aware that in the past some Private Universities benefited from the GETFUND.To mention a few, some of the beneficiaries include Wisconsin, Zenith, Regent, Ashesi and Valley View.Surprisingly, all these logical supports were given by the previous government administration. As we speak today, no private university is benefiting from the fund because of the provision of the GETFUND Act. This creates a dilemma of wondering whether our current government and statesmen disregard the need for private universities. If a portion of GETFUND is going to be made available to support activities of GYEEDA why not the Private Universities.We are requesting the government to make a portion of the GETFUND accessible to all private universities in the country because: Private University Students are part of the Ghanaian citizenry whose parents and sponsors pay taxes. Moreover, the students themselves pay indirect taxes through the value added tax system. Interestingly, parts of these taxes are allocated to the GETFUND account; therefore we demand to be beneficiaries. The GETFUND Act seems to discriminate against the Private Universities students and this is against the CHAPTER 005 of the CONSTITUTION OF THE REBUPLIC OF GHANA (1992) ON FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHT AND FREEDOMS: Which partly reads as follows: 17. (1) All persons shall be equal before the law 2) A person shall not be discriminated against on grounds of gender, race, colour, ethnic origin, religion, creed or social or economic status. (3) For the purposes of this article, discriminate means to give different treatment to different persons attributable only or mainly to their respective descriptions by race, place of origin, political opinions, colour, gender, occupation, religion or creed, whereby persons of one description are subjected to disabilities or restrictions to which persons of another description which are not granted of persons of another description are not made subject or are granted privileges or advantages which are not granted to persons of another description. Ladies and Gentlemen of the media, taken into account sixty eight private universities in the country that is enrolling over 30% of tertiary education students in the country; it is therefore prudent for our leaders create the atmosphere for the law to enforce equal right to every citizenry. A law that is partial to one fraction of people in the society is discriminatory and therefore MUST BE AMENDED.Government should approve GETFUND support for all Ghanaian students, whether they attend public or a private university. UNIVERSITY AFFILIATION AND CHARTER PUSAG again is much aware of the significance of mentoring or affiliation for newly established private universities in the country, and the need to ensure that students are not abandoned midway in their studies in the event of bankruptcy. There is a need for institutions to be financially stable. How can our private universities achieve this stability after paying accreditation and supervision charges and fees to National Accreditation Board and Mentor Universities? On this note, we believe the government would be a hypocrite in communicating financial stability to the public when after ten years of existence they continually expect charges for supervisions every year. PUSAG is calling on Government to give charter status to our member institutions that have been accredited for ten years and over and have their own campus and meet charter requirement. Indeed some of our universities are in their 17th year.The issue of affiliation is a headache to our member institutions. Our member institution is being charged high fees by our so called mentors, which are then passed on to students. We therefore request that Ghana as a nation should take a cue from Romania which gives charter status to private universities after graduating two batches of people thus five years of existence.Even if we don’t replicate this system, private universities should be made to stop payment of affiliation fees after five years of existence. PUSAG is grateful to the Council for Tertiary Education for recommending that the newly created Public Universities be mentored, however we will appreciate that the newly established Public Universities in Ho and Sunyani which have been in existence for less than ten years and equally have structural and administrative challenges be mentored and it status reversed from a fully-fledged university to that of the University College status till they meet the requisite requirement for an autonomy. We therefore ask that all private universities that have been accredited for 10 years or more, that have their own campuses and meet the requirements of a charter, be granted University Charter as soon as possible, without the long bureaucratic processes instituted to milk private universities. IMPOSITION OF TWENTY FIVE PERCENT (25%) CORPORATE TAX ON PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES Again we the Private Universities Students’ Association of Ghana (PUSAG) are aware of the fact that practices in the world generally exempt non-profit making private universities from tax. Tax exemptions however, do not apply to non-core universities or mission related activities but PUSAG wish to state that 25% tax on the profit of our member institutions is on the high side and therefore must be reduced to 10% if not, reversed to its former status of tax free because institutions must embark on expansion projects. The current Tax rate of 25% is going a long way in increasing the burden on our students through fee payments. The government has to undoubtedly understand the need to create an incentive for the private universities if they appreciate the students’ enrollment burden offloaded by these institutions. Ladies and Gentlemen from the inky fraternity, Let us not forget that these institutions are educating the youth who are citizens of this nation. There are international companies operating in this country on tax free basis for a period of time. How come our institutions can’t be granted this status since they are promoting tertiary education to the highest level of standards globally? Apparently, these can beconsidered as steps that are making a quality education very expensive in the country as the fees are passed on for WE-students to pay. Highlights on 2015Budget statement Ladies and gentlemen of the Media, in the 2015 budget statement presented by Minister of Finance Seth Tekper going through it with keen interest, we have realized that private education and for that matter private university education in this country has been neglected to the mercy of the private sector. Surprisingly, the presented 2015 budget statement indicates government has begun moves to implement a free senior high school policy from next year 2015.We as a student body have studied the recent promises made by the government of Ghana led by His Excellency John Dramani Mahama in providing Free Senior High School to the citizenry, it is imperative to note that after the successful completion of the Senior High School programme, government’s Universities in the country cannot have the capacity to admit all these senior high school leavers, hence about 50% of them end up in Private Tertiary institutions. This is an indication of the contribution private universities are making to the growth of education in the country. Even though we have no problem with this direction that government has taken, we think government’s participation through effective supervision of our activities, granting tax holidays, helping us to access support from the GETFund, granting Universities due Charter as per the requirements and among others can help us improve upon the educational standard of the country. We are of the view that the tax waiver given to private sector industries and the removal of corporate tax from raw materials and farming tools in the 2015 budget can be applied to private universities as well. The Minister of Finance also mentioned the allocation of over Ghc 7.6 billion into the educational sector including GETFund. Ladies and gentlemen, Private Universities Student’s are calling on the government to allocate a share of the budgetary fund to the Private Universities in the country since we are also part of the 25 million Ghanaian populations. Private Universities must also have their share of the national cake, hence this press conference to draw the attention of the government that if nothing at all. We therefore called on the President and the Minister of Education to take a second look at the way and manner in which Private Universities are been treated in the country since they may directly or indirectly be beneficiaries of such institutions. Ladies and Gentlemen, before WE end our statements, WE refer you to a Daily Graphic Publication of December 3rd 2014 Front page story with the headline” Industry and Mines to face Dumsor but Public Universities to get relieve” The story partly reads that Even though the load shedding exercise will continue during the Christmas festivities, a special arrangement has been made between the Ministry of Education and Energy and Petroleum for Public Universities to benefit from the limited load shedding exercise” we call on both Ministries to take the Private Universities into consideration to benefit from the intend relieve for the Public Universities. The Minister of Finance also mentioned the allocation of over Ghc 7.6 billion into the educational sector which includes funds allocated to GETFund. Ladies and gentlemen, we as Private Universities Student’s body call on the government to allocate a share of the budgetary fund to Private University Students in the country since we are also part of the 25 million Ghanaian populations. Private Universities also needs to have their share of the national cake, hence this press conference is to draw the attention of the government that if nothing at all, we also have the power to vote and decide the one that have our interests at heart. Formerly we presented a petition and now a press conference, ladies and gentlemen; our next plan of action may not be friendly. We therefore called on the President and the Minister of Education to take a second look at the way and manner in which Private Universities and students are been treated in the country since they may directly or indirectly be beneficiaries of such institutions. Ladies and Gentlemen, before I end my statements, I refer you to a Daily Graphic Publication of December 3rd 2014 Front page story with the headline” Industry and Mines to face “Dumsor” but Public Universities to get relieve” The story partly reads that even though the load shedding exercise will continue during the Christmas festivities, a special arrangement has been made between the Ministry of Education and Energy and Petroleum for Public Universities to benefit from the limited load shedding exercise”. We call on both Ministries to take the Private Universities into consideration to benefit from the intended relieve for the Public Universities. In conclusion, we would like to inform the government and all stakeholders in the educational sector in the country, that we the over 100,000 students and the alumni of the private universities in Ghana have the same voting right as those in the public universities and we must not be taken for granted. It is time they pay attention to the concerns of private universities and their students because we are all citizens of mother Ghana and we also do our national service training as required by law. We are so alarmed and dismayed by the treatment given to us; therefore we would want the government to note that this is our second step in seeking to have our concerns addressed. Our next plan of action may not be as friendly. Long live the students struggle Long live PUSAG Long live Mother Ghana
Posted on: Tue, 16 Dec 2014 18:34:41 +0000
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