Education Minister, Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum, has urged the newly inaugurated Governing Council of the University of Ghana to ensure the global competitiveness of the university remain their utmost concern.

According to him, the Council should avoid being complacent in being only relevant among tertiary institutions in Ghana.

He made this revelation at a ceremony to swear in the 20-member Council. With this, Mr Adutuwm noted that dominance only in the Ghanaian terrain will sparsely affect the country especially when students are prepared for the international community.

“We have full confidence in them as they have been appointed by the President. However, we have also asked them to understand that we live in a global society, and the university’s global competitiveness should be their concern. It should not be enough that they are competitive in Ghana.

“It should require that they look at their competitiveness globally because their competition is not in Ghana”.

The 20 member Council is to be chaired by former Chief Justice, Sophia A.B Akuffo. This announcement and swearing-in of the Council follows the expiration of the old council on May 31, 2021.

Additionally, the new governing Council championed by Sophia Akuffo comes barely a week to the end of the tenure of the current vice-chancellor of the school, Prof. Ebenezer Oduro Owusu.

Government representatives on Council

The Education Minister further indicated that the council must endeavour to consolidate the gains made by the university in years past. To this end, the university will be better positioned as a world-class institution of higher learning.

Coupled with this, government has four representatives on the council. These include, Amos Oppong Amankwah, Justice Barbara Ackah-Yensu, Nana Wereko Ampim-Opoku and Prof. Baffour Agyeman-Duah.

Invariably, the primary task of the new governing council will be to oversee the appointment and replacement for the outgoing vice-chancellor.

Currently, the University is caught up in a legal suit at the Accra High Court over alleged irregularities in its search for a new Vice-Chancellor.

The plaintiff, Patrick Justice Ennin, is seeking to injunct and nullify the work done by the search committee. He argues that the committee was illegally constituted.

Vice Chancellor search committee

Per the University’s statutes, it indicates that a year prior to the post of Vice-Chancellor becoming vacant, or when the post is vacant, the Council shall appoint a search party or committee to propose a successor for the Council’s consideration.

However with just five days nearing the end of the current tenure, the university is yet to conclude processes for the appointment of a successor.

In January 2021, the Search Committee announced that it had received seven applications for the position. Applications for the post included those of Professor Nana Aba Appiah Amfo and Professor Felix Asante. The Pro Vice-Chancellors were both in charge of Academic and Student Affairs and Research, Innovation and Development.

Other applicants includes the Director of ISSER Prof Peter Quartey, Dean of Students, Prof Godfred Bokpin, Prof. Daniel Ofori and Prof. Samuel Cudjoe. The seventh applicant was a faculty member with Pakistan’s IQRA University.