A letter dated September 24, 2025, signed by the Corporate Affairs Director of GTEC, Jerry Sarfo, on behalf of the Director-General of GTEC and addressed to the Registrar of UCC, said GTEC was restoring all services following compliance with its directive.

Restoration

The letter, a copy of which the Daily Graphic has sighted, explained that, "Following the evidence provided by the Registrar of the University of Cape Coast (UCC), complying with the directive issued by the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC) on September 19, 2025, as well as Prof. Johnson Nyarko Boampong taking up the case in court, GTEC, with immediate effect, restores all services that were earlier withdrawn to UCC”.

The letter gave the assurance that UCC had been put back on the GTEC website as a fully accredited institution.

"We are grateful to the Registrar and management of UCC for their cooperation during the period," it added.

Sources

The Daily Graphic has gathered that there has been a high-level meeting at UCC, which agreed on a roadmap for implementing the directives of GTEC towards ending the impasse.

It is this exercise that gives the commission the satisfaction that its directives would be followed to the letter, hence the need to restore its services to the university to forestall any unintended consequences.

Background

GTEC’s directive follows days of a stand-off between GTEC and the Vice-Chancellor of UCC, Prof. Boampong, over his compulsory retirement age, which took a different twist.

The punitive action initiated by GTEC last Monday stated that the commission, with immediate effect, would not process any request from the UCC in respect of accreditation, salaries (government subventions), GETFund support, Book and Research Allowances, Post Retirement Contracts, Financial Clearance for Recruitment, and any other related requests.

The letter, signed by the Deputy Director-General of GTEC, Prof. Augustine Ocloo, and addressed to the Registrar of the UCC, stated that all the punitive measures would remain until there was full compliance with the directive and evidence of compliance was furnished to the commission.

The impasse between the Vice-Chancellor and GTEC threatened to disrupt academic and administrative activities, potentially affecting more than 70,000 students and 4,000 staff.

Retirement age

Earlier, a GTEC letter, dated September 19, 2025, signed by Prof. Ocloo on behalf of the Director-General, addressed to Prof. Boampong and copied to eight other people, including the Minister of Education, the Chancellor and the Chairman of the UCC Governing Council, indicated that Article 199 (1) of the constitution states that, "A public officer shall, except as otherwise provided in this Constitution, retire from the public service on attaining the age of 60 years."

The letter sighted by the Daily Graphic, stated, "again, the Office of the Vice-Chancellor, being an office established under Section 7(1) of the University of Cape Coast Act, 1992 (PNDCL 278), is a public office under the meaning and intendment of Article 199(1), hence anyone acting in the office of the Vice-Chancellor is presumptively mandated to proceed on compulsory retirement upon attaining 60 years."

On the tenure of the Vice-Chancellor, Statute 8.2 of the University of Cape Coast Statutes 2016 states that: "The Vice-Chancellor shall hold office for an initial term of four years. The appointment may be renewed for a further term of up to three years if that is not beyond the statutory retiring age of 60."

It went further to indicate that "stemming from the above stated laws, and with the Commission's regulatory mandate enshrined in section 7 of the Education Regulatory Bodies Act, 2020 (Act 1023), the Pro-Vice Chancellor, Prof. Denis Worlanyo Aheto, was to act in the interim.” 

Prof. Boampong's response

However, in a swift rebuttal, a letter dated September 19, 2025, written by his lawyers in response to the GTEC directive, Prof. Boampong dismissed the directives issued by GTEC.

He indicated, “he would ignore the said letter and continue to act in office as directed by the University Statutes and in accordance with the orders of the court."  

Stakeholders

Stakeholders have called for dialogue to resolve the impasse, instead of the entrenched positions, in the interest of the entire university community.

The Head of Legal of UCC, Solomon Faakye, in an interview with the Daily Graphic, expressed optimism that the matter would be resolved very soon, so that the university could continue with its operations.

“I think that cool heads will prevail. Engagement and dialogue are the only way out because it will be practically impossible for GTEC to say that it will not perform its public duties to another public institution funded by the taxpayer.

GTEC can have a problem with the Vice-Chancellor, but why should students and workers suffer?” Mr Faakye queried.

However, should dialogue not resolve the issue, he said, the university would not hesitate to go to court to assert its rights.