The Tertiary Education Workers Union of Ghana (TEWU-GH) chapter at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) has expressed its concern over the university management's failure to release members' dues. The union warns that if the management does not address this issue promptly, it may result in the disruption of academic activities.
The union alleges that the university management has been unwilling to acknowledge them as TEWU-Ghana in the university council and other committees since they decided to separate from the Trades Union Congress (TUC) approximately a year ago. This lack of recognition has become a point of contention between the union and the management.
During a media address following the swearing-in ceremony of the newly appointed executives of the TEWU-GH KNUST branch, Chairman Charles Arthur revealed the union's intentions to initiate a strike if the management does not fulfill their demands.
Chairman Charles Arthur emphasized that the Labour Act explicitly mandates unions to safeguard and advocate for the social and economic rights of their members. In light of this, he stated that if the management fails to fulfill their responsibility of paying the deducted funds from employees' salaries, which has been ongoing for over a year, and if the union members express their discontent on these matters, the union will actively support them.
Please note that the provided information has been rephrased based on the original statement. For the most accurate and up-to-date details, it is advisable to refer to reliable news sources or directly consult the union's official statements.
“We are not going to tamper with the mid-semester exams which come off next week but if after the exams management of KNUST fails to meet our demands, we are going to cause a shakeup and that may include a strike”, he declares.
He revealed the reason behind the need to break away from TEWU-TUC to establish TEWU-GH.
“TEWU-TUC was compromised and was not fighting for our welfare so all public universities decided to create TEWU-GH in 2022. It is disheartening for the management of KNUST to claim that they don’t know the difference between us (TEWU-GH) and the other union. Even on committees that we are supposed to be on them, the management of the university has prevented us from having representation, making it difficult for us to fight for the interest of our members.
Three months after we have come into force, the vice-chancellor herself told us that some people said they don’t belong to us so they cannot recognize us as a union and we only know if the university management is conniving with some people to form a nameless, faceless or ghosts”, he decried.
Mr. Arthur, therefore, called the minister of education and other stakeholders to intervene before the union undertakes any action.
“We have promised to cooperate and collaborate with the university because we don’t want to be called bad people so we want the minister of education to intervene in this matter but if management fails to address our requests, then they should be ready for any action we take which may disrupt the activities of the university”, he warned.
A 5-member executive was sworn in office to steer the affairs of the KNUST branch of TEWU-GH for the next four years.
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