By: Deborah Amewoyi
President John Dramani Mahama during his maiden adress to the country on the floor of parliament earlier today Feburary 27 have indicated that there would be no cancellation of the Free Senior High School policy which was implemented by the previous government.
In his address, the president rather hinted on it’s intentions to improve the implementation of the policy rather than calling it to a halt. “Mr Speaker, once again for emphasis, and for the record, I, John Dramani Mahama, President of the Republic of Ghana, will not cancel the free SHS programme. I am determined to make it better by improving its implementation” the president declared. The president has revealed that the outcome of the ongoing National Education Forum will provide guidelines for the necessary reforms to the policy.
Additionally, the president have nullified statistics published by the “Nana Addo” led government indicating that the total number of beneficiaries of the free shs policy since its inception amounts to 5.1 million. The president has called on the public to disregard such figures clarifying that about 3.4 million people have been beneficiaries of the free shs program so far.
Despite maintaining the policy, the president have vowed to cross out the double track system citing that they pose challenges to the second cycle educational system. “The double-track system remains a challenge, and we are committed to eliminating it by accelerating school infrastructure expansion and completing stalled projects.” he announced.
To see this project come to light the president have revealed that the Ministry of Finance in collaboration with the Education Ministry will brainstorm appropriate means to access GETFund to furnish stalled secondary school projects.
The president asserted that the government have begun improving meals for students as part of the school feeding programme initiative. He has promised that once ongoing discussions are concluded, management and procurement of food for the various senior high school across the country will be decentralized to school heads for easy distribution.
