The Bolgatanga branch of the Technical University Teachers’ Association of Ghana (TUTAG) and the Technical University Senior Administrators’ Association of Ghana (TUSAAG) have withdrawn their services.

The Bolgatanga branches of TUTAG and TUSAAG say they will continue to withdraw their services until their demands are met.

In a statement, the two associations accuse the Vice Chancellor of seeking to vary portions of their “Conditions of Service (CoS) as approved by the Ministry of Finance (MoF) by hiding behind claims of ambiguity in the Technical Universities Act (2016), Act 922 as Amended”.

To this, the Bolgatanga branch of TUTAG and TUSAAG said, “We outright reject.”

According to the two associations, their strike is “based on misinterpretations of portions” of their CoS pertaining to the retirement benefit by the Vice Chancellor to their disadvantage”.

“We find Ghana Tertiary Education Commission’s (GTEC) decision to refer this matter to the Attorney General for interpretation as a time-wasting tactic since GTEC’s submission at the NLC on the 23rd of August 2023 indicated that the Attorney General’s interpretation was only to guide the commission regarding the “perceived” ambiguity and shall not be binding on any Technical University (TU).

“So if the essence of the Attorney General’s so-called interpretation of the Transitional Provisions is only to serve as a guide for GTEC, then we consider this whole exercise as delay tactics,” the Bolgatanga branch of TUTAG and TUSAAG noted.

They, therefore, demanded the immediate payment of the “internal component of the Online Teaching Support Allowance (OTSA) and its accrued arrears for teaching staff that have not paid since January 2022”.