Member of Parliament for Adaklu in the Volta Region, Kwame Agbodza, has lambasted the ruling NPP government for not consulting experts and stakeholders within the education sector before rolling out the free senior high school policy.
According to Mr.Agboza, the government did not properly plan the free senior high school policy before it was rolled out, something that he said has raised the issue of sustainability.
“When you want to do something like a fundamental change to education and health, you need to subject this to some understanding of the people who matter,” he said.
“When we were trying to change from the middle school to JSS, there were committees setup to review all these things, but for the first time, a government came and said Free SHS, and without any consultation with anybody, they sat at the NPP headquarters, decided Free SHS and came and tried to implement it,” Mr. Agbodza added.
He continued that the government has nothing to lose if they admit that they made a mistake in planning and implementing the programme and therefore advised that the government should go back to the drawing board and plan the policy well.
Meanwhile he believes, the cost of running the Free SHS policy is high, hence it will be difficult to sustain it.
“There is nothing wrong if you are a politician and you tell the truth, okay? We promised this, however starting, we think going forward it will not work. We are calling on stakeholders; let’s sit down, what is the best way to take this forward?” he suggested.
He continued that there are parents who took their wards to expensive private basic schools but are compelled to say they can’t pay because of the Free SHS programme.
However he concluded that, Free SHS should be given as scholarship to individuals who cannot actually afford to pay for tuition.
Meanwhile the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II at the weekend called for adequate provision for infrastructure at various Universities to cater for students of the Free SHS programme.
Government in its planning of free SHS made no provision for the beneficiaries in the tertiary institutions.
Earlier this year, government stated that an amount of GH₵453 million of Ghana’s oil revenue will be used to fund the Free SHS programme.
3news.com
