Kumasi Polytechnic has been closed down indefinitely as efforts to end POTAG strike hit a snag. Authorities have put on hold the end of semester examinations with students having up to Saturday evening to leave campus. The decision was taken at a marathon meeting between Executive Committee of the polytechnic and the Student Representative Council. The three-week old industrial action by the Polytechnic Teachers Association of Ghana has taken a toll on students, as the academic calendar has been disrupted. Not even a petition by frustrated students to the Presidency could get the lecturers back to the lecture halls. They are demanding payment of revised salaries following their migration onto the single spine pay policy. Authorities want to get first and second year students to take their industrial attachment during the break until August, though no date has been set to recall them. Rector of Kumasi Polytechnic, Professor Nicholas Nsowah-Nuamah, says decision to close down the school is the best option under the current circumstances. He appealled to parents and guardians to bear with the authorities. “The students had been idle for more than 2-weeks now and we cannot continue keeping the students here. By the statutes, when students are idle for more than 21-days, we have to close down the school”. Professor Nsowah-Nuamah in his capacity as rector has been trying to convince the lecturers back to the lecture halls, but all to no avail. “POTAG-Kumasi met today, I was there trying to convince them, it didn’t work. So the only alternative for us now is not to keep the students doing nothing”. The student body has welcomed the Polytechnic Executive Committee’s move. Vice- President of the K-Poly branch of the Student Representative Council, Isaac Owusu commended school authorities for taking the right decision at the right time. “As it stands now that is what the students want…I think it’s a decision in the right direction”, he explained.