Reports reaching DAILY GUIDE indicate that four top officials, including reverend ministers, of the Presbyterian University College (PUC), have been suspended indefinitely for alleged financial malpractices and mismanagement.

The affected officials are Reverend Asamoah Boadu, Accountant/Director of Finance; his deputy, Martin Amaniampong; the Coordinator of Tema Campus, Reverend Adu Okoree and the Director of Works, Kobby Lartey, who is the son of the outgoing President of the institution.

According to sources, the University Council, at the instance of the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana, Rt. Rev. Professor Emmanuel Martey, has set up a committee to investigate the activities of the suspended officials.

DAILY GUIDE gathered that the outgoing president, Professor Kofi Sraku Lartey and Kwadwo Amo Osei, the Registrar of the University, had been accused of putting up hostels at the various campuses of the institution namely, Abetifi, Agogo and Akuapim-Akropong and rented them out to students at exorbitant rates.

Our sources intimated that the director of finance and the management had not been paying the lecturers appropriate salaries as they (lecturers) are said to receive not more than GH¢600 basic salary.

The sources added that the outgoing president appointed his son, Kobby Lartey, as the director of works who was in-charge of all projects at the various campuses, after his first degree in Civil Engineering at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology [KNUST].

The four suspended officials, this paper was informed, had put up mansions in Accra, Kwahu-Pepease and Nkwatia and are riding in 4×4 vehicles, which most of the staff and the students had been complaining of, wondering where they got the money from to finance those projects.

In related development, a retired lecturer, Dr. Adu Opako, has taken the university to an Accra High Court for failing to pay him his nine months’ salary amounting to GH¢10,000, and claiming other damages. The case is scheduled for November this year for hearing.

Registrar’s Reactions

When DAILY GUIDE contacted the Registrar, Amo Osei, about the matter, he failed to comment on it.

Mr. Amo further directed this reporter to contact the University Public Relations Officer, Reverend Kofi Antwi, who also denied knowledge of it, and asked for one week to find out more about it.

There is every indication that some of the university staff were also gearing up to take court action against the authorities concerning the malpractices.