<<Print>>

Former First Lady, Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings, has accused some government officials including a Deputy Minister of Education in charge of Tertiary, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, of plotting to disrupt a lecture that was to be delivered by her at the University of Ghana campus on Friday.

The leader of the National Democratic Party (NDP) specifically mentioned the name of Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa in an interaction with Citi News’ Duke Mensah Opoku.

The programme dubbed ‘Time With Legon”, was being organised by the University of Ghana SRC, the Commonwealth Hall JCR and the Graduate Students Association of Ghana, GRASAG.

According to Duke Mensah Opoku, the programme that was scheduled to start at 5:00pm was delayed for about an hour after school authorities called in to say they were unaware of the event.

“The organisers received a call from the Dean of Students who said he did not have information about the programme although the management of Commonwealth Hall had previously agreed for the programme to be held at the Observatory.”

According to the Dean, the programme could not be held at the venue which is an open place due to the personalities involved. The organizers according to Duke, asked the authorities to allow the programme to take place at the conference room but that also was turned down.

The programme eventually came off after the venue was shifted to the Amphitheater.

.
The President of the Legon branch of GRASAG, Raymond Ayilo expressed his disappointment at the turn of events saying Nana Konadu was only invited to inspire graduates as they prepare to face the world.

Organisers disappointed

“Our concerns are that, of late student programmes have faced a lot of frustrations on campus. This programme was scheduled to bring the former First Lady to come and inspire the students of the school on current issues of Ghana and motivate them to take up their role after graduating. There is no intention to this programme apart from the fact that we see her role in Ghana’s democracy as one who has played a role as a former First Lady and has inspired several women including the young people and so we felt it was wise to bring her to inspire students as we go out of this University to also contribute our quota to the development of this country. But now we are not being allowed to have the programme and Nana Konadu is here with us and the media is here with us witnessing all that is happening. All attempts to get management to understand the situation have failed”.

According to Mr. Ayilo, they had to make do with another space for the programme to go ahead only because the former First Lady was on campus already and so the programme could not be cancelled.

“The idea was completely to stop the programme from happening so we met with the hall master of commonwealth hall since the First Lady was already on Campus. So we were directed to wherever we want to host at the back of the hall and that’s what we did.”

Bawumia’s lecture allegedly stopped by gov’t 

The running mate to the Flagbearer of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Mahamoud Bawumia, has recently accused government elements of frustrating his lecture at some tertiary institutions, by ensuring that authorities of the school denied him access to their premises.