{"id":233675,"date":"2016-07-24T12:00:06","date_gmt":"2016-07-24T12:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=233675"},"modified":"2016-07-24T12:00:06","modified_gmt":"2016-07-24T12:00:06","slug":"research-fund-useless-without-researchers-ug-vice-chancellor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2016\/07\/research-fund-useless-without-researchers-ug-vice-chancellor\/","title":{"rendered":"Research fund ‘useless’ without researchers – UG Vice Chancellor"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Outgoing Vice Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Professor Ernest Aryeetey, has stated that the new Research Fund will be rendered useless if those appointed to manage it have no background in research themselves.<\/p>\n
According to him, several ministries have representatives on the management of the fund, cautioning that once there are\u00a0no people directly involved in research, the fund might not be put to good use.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”px9qCPG0UQPGRf1DfcIcsHpc7VvfoGcs”]\u201cIf you look at the system that\u2019s been put in place in order to manage the fund, there\u2019s not one single person there who knows about research,\u201d Professor Ernest Aryeetey said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are representing Ministry of this, Ministry of that; the typical way of doing things. You are there because your ministry must be interested in this. It doesn\u2019t matter whether you know anything about research or not. The fund will be in place but the research won\u2019t get done because those managing it don\u2019t know how to do research anyway and those going there don\u2019t do any research anyway. So the structure of it will make it useless,\u201d Professor Ernest Aryeetey said<\/p>\n
Speaking at a forum in Accra, Professor Ernest Aryeetey stated that, the Research fund appeared to have been created to address issues concerning Book and Research allowances.<\/p>\n
However, he believes a bigger research funding issue persists, which the limited fund would be able to solve.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is quite clear in the document that the only reason for creating the fund is to deal with the Book and Research Allowance. You are doing the right thing of having the fund in place, but for a very wrong reason of solving a small problem that can be dealt with directly,\u201d Professor Aryeetey added.<\/p>\n
President Mahama announced\u00a0earlier in July, that government has released 37 million Ghana cedis to the Controller and Accountant Generals Department, to pay Book and Research allowances for the 2015-2016 academic year as this will help in enhancing research<\/p>\n
He however added that, it was his hope that a consensus will soon be reached<\/strong><\/a><\/span> on the mutually acceptable National Research fund.<\/p>\n