Prez inaugurates A-Poly block of flats

Page 3
30-10-08

President J. A. Kufuor yesterday inaugurated a number of facilities at the Accra Polytechnic to enhance effective teaching and learning there.
The projects, which were financed through the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) and the polytechnic’s internally generated funds, were a five-storey block of 20 three-bedroom flats, a five-storey block of 20 two-bedroom flats, a five-storey block comprising two-bedroom flats and a five-storey block of 20 one-bedroom flats.
The rest were a water supply and distribution system on campus, block to house the Bachelor of Technology and a library, an Electrical and Electronic Engineering block and a 500 KVA electricity generating plant.
The accommodation facilities will be occupied by about 80 members of staff of the polytechnic who, hitherto, had to commute from long distances to school.
Performing the inauguration ceremony, President Kufuor said never had such massive infrastructural development taken place in the polytechnics in the country within a short time.
That, according to him, was the extent of the government’s commitment to higher education and the development of polytechnics in general.
He commended the authorities of the polytechnic for using its limited space to put up such facilities.
He said although the population was increasing, land was not, and, therefore, stressed the need for those in the capital to be economical in the use of space for providing accommodation.
“You have demonstrated by the construction of these tall structures that we can satisfy the demand for accommodation in a confined space without sacrificing aesthetic considerations. Your buildings help to brighten the capital’s skyline to add to the city’s beauty,” he stated.
President Kufuor said polytechnics occupied a significant place in the tertiary educational sector, since their mandate was “to provide training of a kind that does not obtain anywhere else in the sector”.
Beyond the traditional Higher National Diploma (HND), he said, the legal instrument provided polytechnic education now opened up the possibilities of training at the level of bachelor’s degree and beyond, adding that “it is possible to start at one type of institution to complete at another, transferring grades”.
Commenting on the forthcoming elections, he urged the staff and students to ensure that their utterances and actions, both on campus and within their communities, would be aimed at promoting free, fair and credible elections, to which the government was committed.
He said as role models, they were in a position to help make the elections successful.
The Rector of the Accra Polytechnic, Prof Festus Addo-Yobo, commended the government for funding the projects, saying that “these demonstrate the government’s positive attitude towards teaching and research in the Applied Sciences and Technology and Applied Arts and the provision of technical skills within the polytechnics”.
He said the polytechnic had responded positively to the government’s assistance by setting a target to become a world-class polytechnic, adding that the projects would go a long way to help it to achieve its ambitions.
Prof Addo-Yobo appealed to the government to assist the polytechnic to acquire land for the construction of hostel facilities outside the campus to provide more accommodation facilities for its students.
The Chairman of the Polytechnic Council, Mr Napoleon Bulley, who chaired the function, described the provision of the facilities as historic.