MPs disagree over restrictions at Legon
Members of Parliament (MPs) were Tuesday divided among themselves over whether or not the authorities of the University of Ghana were right in restricting entrance to the campus at some of its entry points.
While many of the MPs condemned the development and called for a decisive action on the part of the House, others sought to hold brief for the university, saying what occurred last Monday could not be deemed outright restriction, as some would want the nation to believe.
The MP for Asawase, Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak, who first raised the issue on the floor of the House, said the university is an institution of higher learning and could not restrict people from entry, as if it were a mere secondary school.
He referred the House to a contribution to a statement he had made in July 2010, when the University of Ghana Act was being debated in the House and said the clause, which reads: "A person who is not a member of the university shall not enter the premises of the university or shall not have access to the privileges of the university without prior permission of the university", was discriminatory.
He said in 2010, when the bill was being debated, he raised a similar point but a member of the University Council at the time, Prof Kofi Kumado, had stated during a meeting with him and other MPs that the clause would not be used to restrict entry.
According to him, Prof Kumado had explained that the clause had been put there to ensure that if, in the future, any group massed up and attempted to enter the university to foment trouble, the authorities could use that clause to stop them.
Alhaji Muntaka said not only had the university reneged on that promise but had also gone further to restrict entry by members of the university, such as alumni and students, by demanding that they purchase stickers before being permitted to enter the institution.
At that juncture, the MP for Dormaa Central, Mr Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, rose on a point of order, saying what was happening at the university was not tantamount to a restriction, as was being portrayed by Alhaji Muntaka.
He said it was "permission on condition" and urged the MP for Asawase to desist from creating what he thought was a false impression.
But Alhaji Muntaka insisted that it was restriction and urged MPs to delve into the issue and stop the university from charting the path it had chosen.
The MP for Sekondi, Papa Owusu-Ankomah, said the MP for Asawase had got it all wrong.
According to Papa Owusu-Ankomah, the university administration had announced, prior to the commencement of the action, that it was "reorganising the use of its entry points as a matter of security" and had also made it clear that only the Okponglo entrance was open to the public.
He said the university had stated that any one who sought to use any other entrance needed to purchase a sticker at the cost of GH¢400 per annum.
In his opinion, therefore, any impression that the university was restricting access at all its entry points was a false one made not based on the facts available.
Government to blame
Papa Owusu-Ankomah said what had happened in the university in the past few days was the result of a lack of coherence in government policy and the permission granted to the university to use its own funds to repair its roads.
"Is that the proper use of internally generated funds?" he queried.
He said the partial restriction by the university was to create a conducive atmosphere for academic work, but some ‘Rambos’, without due process, demolished the structures.
He said the government should never have permitted the university to use its internally generated funds to rehabilitate roads and also called for concensus on such issues in the future.
The MP for Bimbilla, Mr Dominic Nitiwul, agreed that the problem began when the government, in the 2010 budget, permitted some agencies to "borrow money on their own balance sheet".
"I do not know how a university could be bold enough to borrow money if the government did not give its express permission to do so," he said.
At that juncture, the MP for North Tongu, Mr Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa, rose on a point of order.
He made it clear that the government did not grant the university permission to borrow money, saying the University Council was totally independent of the government and took decisions it thought were in the interest of the institution.
He advised Mr Nitiwul not to draw the government into the matter.
Mr Nitiwul, continuing with his submission, said there was a public outcry as a result of the action by the university, adding that the House and the university needed to find a "middle ground" to allow members of the public to enter the university.
Legon not a republic
The MP for Ashaiman, Mr Alfred Agbesi, urged the University Council to take a second look at the decision it had taken.
He said as a result of the sticker directive, many parents were unable to send their children to and from school.
He urged the House to take a second look at the portions of the University of Ghana Law which empowered the university to embark on that line of action and amend it.
"The University of Ghana cannot be a Republic unto itself," he said.
The First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Mr Ebo Barton-Odro, who was in the Speaker's chair, directed that the ministers of Education and Roads and Highways meet with the parliamentary committees on Roads and Transport and Education to, within two weeks, draw plans on how to resolve the matter amicably.
He stressed that what Parliament had discussed had nothing to do with road tolls in the university.
The issue, he said, had to do with stickers and restrictions at some entry points.
