The Director General of the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission, Prof Abdulai Jinapor, has urged the Deputy Minister for Health, Dr Grace Ayensu Danquah, to do away with her current legal representatives.

Speaking in a Joy FM interview on Monday, August 18, 2025, Prof Jinapor accused the deputy minister and her legal team of being inconsistent about her academic credentials.

“Two weeks to respond to her demand? That she is a full professor, an assistant professor, or an adjunct assistant professor? Which is which? As I have indicated, the lawyers have not been helpful to her cause, and if I am advising her, I think the lawyers need to be fired,” he stated.

The statement by Prof Jinapor comes on the back of an August 13, 2025, letter addressed to the management of GTEC by the lawyers of the deputy minister over her use of the academic title “Professor.”

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Dr Ayensu Danquah, who also serves as the Member of Parliament for Essikado-Ketan, was directed by GTEC to cease using the title, as the Commission concluded she does not hold the rank of Professor in any capacity.

GTEC, in a letter dated August 12, 2025, addressed to the Chief of Staff and copied to various high-ranking offices, warned that her continued use of the title could lead to legal action for public deception.

In response, Dr Ayensu Danquah’s legal team, led by David K Ametefe, accused GTEC of bias, overreach, and procedural irregularities. They criticized the Commission’s approach as “abrasive, unnecessarily combative, and disparaging,” arguing that its assessment of her credentials lacked transparency and statutory backing.

The lawyers highlighted that Dr Ayensu Danquah was appointed as an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Surgery at the University of Utah, and they rejected GTEC’s stance that only tenure-track appointments qualify for the title “Professor,” calling it inconsistent with international academic norms like the UNESCO Global Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications.

Dr Grace Ayensu-Danquah does not hold the title of 'professor' in any capacity - GTEC

The lawyers made various demands, including a disclosure of GTEC’s evaluation process, clarification of its legal authority, and evidence that their client was given a fair chance to respond.

The lawyers also challenged GTEC’s decision to involve offices like Parliament and the Presidency, labeling it “potentially defamatory” and politically motivated while warning that a failure by GTEC to address their concerns within 14 days would lead to legal action.

But reacting to the interview, Prof Jinapor pointed out that a chronology of events shows a clear pattern of inconsistency between the deputy minister and her legal representatives.

“The Honourable Deputy Minister of Health, an MP, said on national TV that she is a full professor from the University of Utah, Department of Surgery. That is a statement of fact,” Prof Jinapor stated.

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He outlined evidence contrary to the claims by Dr Ayensu Danquah and her lawyers.

“Her lawyers wrote to GTEC and indicated that she is an assistant professor at Utah. The University of Utah wrote to GTEC and indicated that she is an adjunct assistant professor,” he said.

He added that attempts by GTEC to resolve the issue privately with the MP before an escalation of the matter had yielded negative results.

He revealed that a scheduled meeting between the board chairman of GTEC and Dr Ayensu Danquah to get her to stop using the title failed.

“She didn’t heed that,” he stated.

He emphasized that the Commission’s interest is not to target individuals but to ensure academic integrity.

“As a matter of fact, as we speak, she has not been able to provide us with a document that points to her appointment, whether as a full professor, an assistant professor, or an adjunct professor,” Prof Jinapor stated.

He thus challenged the deputy minister to come clean and prove her credentials, warning that the confusion around the issue may fester if she fails to do so.

GA

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