Dr Stephen K Donyinah, a Senior Lecturer at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, on Thursday noted that general politicisation of ideas has restrained the academia from contributing to matters of national development.
He said until partisan politics, which has taken the fabric of the Ghanaian society is rooted out of national discussions; the academia would remain reluctant in contributing to critical issues of national relevance.
Addressing journalists and civil society organisations in the extractive sector at a forum in Accra, Dr Donyinah said it is unfortunate Ghanaians dig deeper and trace the political background of personalities in the academic front, whenever they contribute to national issues.
The forum, on the theme: “Assessing oil and gas in Ghana governance and accountability framework,” was organised by Penplusbytes, International Institute of ICT Journalism and attended by 10 journalists’ currently undergoing oil and gas training programme.
Dr Donyniah who is a lecturer at the Chemical Engineering Department, said instead of Ghanaians to critically analyse the thoughts and contributions of people, they rather read unnecessary meanings into ideas because of their partisan bias.
“ It very sad that while the academia considers how best to use technology to solve emerging national problems, selfish individual politicians and their cronies also think on how to make monies for themselves,” he added.
Notwithstanding, the Senior Lecturer emphasized that “we need to sit up as a country”, take opportunity of technological advancement and join the league of oil producing countries.
Delivering a paper on the topic “engineering and technological challenges of the oil and gas industry in Ghana”, Dr Donyinah said the country could explore new areas of oil frontiers in the offshore by the use of modern technology.
Mr Victor Brobbey, a research fellow (governance and legal policy), at the Centre for Democratic Governance, said citizens of Ghana ought to begin to demand accountability from public office holders.
He said though there is a specific law to regulate the petroleum management revenue, individual Ghanaians had to shoulder the responsibility to check the inflows and outflows of the income.
