The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer, John Dramani Mahama, has declared his intention to reverse the names assigned by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to certain public universities in Ghana if he is re-elected in the 2024 polls.
President Akufo-Addo, upon assuming office, renamed several public universities.
Notably, the University for Development Studies (UDS), Wa campus was renamed after SD Dombo [Simon Diedong Dombo], a United Party tradition politician, and is now known as Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies (SDD-UBIDS) in the Upper West Region, and the C.K. Tedam University of Technology and Applied Sciences (CKT-UTAS) in the Upper East Region.
In 2018, the President also renamed the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT) to the George Grant University of Mines and Technology.
Addressing supporters in the Upper East Region, John Dramani Mahama criticized the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government for renaming universities established by the NDC government after their heroes. He questioned the logic behind renaming existing universities when the NPP government has not initiated the construction of any new universities.
Mahama emphasized the importance of naming libraries, hostels, and administration blocks after individuals, asserting that the names of public universities should align with their core mandates.
“We are known as nation builders because of the number of schools we have built. Every public university was initiated and built by us. All the NPP knows how to do is name universities that people have built. After NDC builds a university, then they will give it the name of one of their heroes or people. We are going to rename the universities. Ghana has many heroes, and not only the heroes of the NPP tradition.
He emphasized, “We can name an administration block, hostel, and library after somebody. But the university must reflect its core mandate. And so we will restore the original names, and the names that they have given them will be given to significant infrastructure in the universities. And we will add other people and name the infrastructure in the universities after them. But if the university is the University for Development Studies, that is its core mandate. It will be called the University for Development Studies.”