POTAG national Conference to declare verdict on ongoing strike

The Polytechnic teachers association (POTAG) is meeting in Accra in a national conference to discuss the way forward after their two week long strike action.

The conference is being attended by National Executives of POTAG as well as POTAG chairmen and two of their executives from each of the Polytechnics in the country.

The polytechnic teachers are demanding the restoration of their Book and Research Allowance that has been replaced with a National Research and innovation Fund.

The lecturers have thus withdrawn all academic services to the nation’s polytechnics to pressure government to heed their demands.

Ahead of the conference however, President of the Ashanti regional branch of POTAG, Edmond Oppong Peprah indicated strongly it is unlikely the strike would be called off.

He said the association feels let down by the national labor commission which has declared their industrial action illegal.

“We wrote to the commission on the 15th of April stating governments refusal to pay book and research allowances with the view that they would summon government to explain why. They have not done any of these and then they describe our intension to strike as ambiguous,” he fumed.

He said as far as he was concerned, “POTAG is resolute that because government has failed to meet their demands, we are not compromising and that is POTAG’s stance.”