By: Nyima Sillah
The Ministry of Higher Education Research Science and Technology has been accused of manipulation by the Vice President of the University of the Gambia Staff Association.
Speaking to The Voice exclusively, Dr. Ensa Touray said: “In the constitution of The Gambia nobody should be in an interim position or assumption of an interim position,(if there is it) should not exist one year or six months. This minister maintains the interim council for more than 4 years from the time of political change up to now. Why is he doing that? He asked rhetorically.
Dr Touray added that “this minister ignored the needs to reconstitute and act as a substantive position or council why? All these manipulations owing to failure to establish structural order are driven by his agenda to manipulate and weaken the structure of the governance of the university in order to have access to university resources. We have all evidence of that.”
However, he called on President Barrow to intervene and help address the situation.
According to him “since he refused to embark on a necessary reform agenda, he (the Minister) doesn’t deserve to stay in that position, he generated a condition that is hostile to the viability of higher educational reforms. We were struggling so we went for a sit-down strike so that they could increase our benefits. The minister decided to increase it with 25% for all the lecturers and others, but when they attempted to increase it the university management came with their own proposition for their own to be increased to 100%. Dr Alieu Gibba at that time was present when they came with the proposal he rejected it. So, they refused and waited until Dr Alieu was not in the meeting and they actually endorsed the proposal to increase the housing allowance for the management to 96%,” he explained.
“Between the differences is 70% so we are asking for that 70% to be paid because we are scholars, why should we be different in terms of housing allowance and they were given cash for the whole year. Ours is given every month,” he continued.
He also said the council generated a condition where the University of The Gambia internally is characterized by imbalance in terms of benefits. Adding that, this imbalance in terms of benefits and payment was instituted by this council.