The reason is simple: the state run tertiary institution is cash-strapped, following the failure of the government to release funds needed to run the university, which is also supposed to have a satellite campus at Dormaa Ahenkro.

 

Underground investigations conducted by The Chronicle indicate that apart from six month salary arrears, the university has also failed to settle its statutory payments to the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) among a host of others, because it does not have enough internally generated funds to meet its commitments.

 

What has even made matters worse is the fact that the tenure of office of the University Governing Council has long expired, whilst that of the Vice Chancellor would expire in July this year, but no efforts are being made to reconstitute it.

 

According to information available to The Chronicle, the Ministry of Education has been informed, through the National Council of Tertiary Education (NCTE), to facilitate the nomination of government appointees to pave way for the reconstitution of the Council.

 

The Ministry, however, directed that the Interim Council, which was put in place, should continue to act until further notice. The Ministry further directed that the Interim Council should set up a Search Committee for the appointment of a Vice Chancellor.  The Executive Secretary of the NCTE, however, shot down the directive from the Ministry, arguing that the Interim Council had no mandate to take major decisions.

 

The Chronicle was told that since the Vice Chancellor’s tenure of office ends in July this year, and with no substantive council in place, a crisis is clearly staring in the face of the university. Some of the top management members and staff, who spoke to The Chronicle, called on the government to immediately address the problem by reconstituting the Governing Council of the university.

 

The University of Energy and Natural Resources, which has been in existence for close to three years, lacks adequate lecture halls which is thwarting the ability to enroll more students. The six unit classroom block on the Sunyani campus, which was initiated by the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund), is still uncompleted.

 

The Dormaa Campus is also operating from rented facilities. Attempts to get the Deputy Minister of Education in charge of Tertiary Education, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, to comment on the issue, proved futile ,as all calls and text messages sent to him were not responded to.