‘Nana Addo’s free SHS is a lie’

BY: EVANS OSEI BAFFOUR

The New Patriotic Party flag-bearer for the 2012 General Election, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, is under fire for his ‘complicated’ educational policy.A group calling itself Movement for Accountable Leadership (MAL) has described the NPP flag bearer’s free Senior High School educational policy as complicated and therefore asked him to explain to Ghanaians how he intends to implement it. According to the group, the claim that he would make Senior High School (SHS) education free when elected as president of Ghana is “a cheap propaganda” which must not be taken seriously by Ghanaian voters if he fails to explain them.“Nana Akufo-Addo should- as a matter of urgency- come out to explain to the entire nation the strategies he would be adopting to implement his ‘free SHS’ for all Ghanaians,” Isaac Oteng, the spokesperson of the group told Today in an interview.Mr. Oteng reiterated that former President Kufuor during his regime deceived Ghanaians that Junior High School was free but woefully failed to put in place measures to run the system more efficiently.This, he said, resulted in the collapse of the JHS system, adding that that also made most pupils especially from the public schools to fail many of whom have become redundant after school. “Nana Addo’s government failed to improve the JHS level to become more attractive for all to enjoy; giving more room for the private sector to monopolise the system; he now wants to muddy the clean waters of the current system that we are experiencing now regarding the SHS level,” he added. The group further questioned the modus operandi that Nana Addo would employ to sustain the free SHS for all irrespective of one’s lineage, political affiliation or qualification.“We the youth will no longer allow ourselves to be used by politicians to propagate their baseless and unfulfilled campaign promises. Since those days are over, it is time politicians like Nana Addo and his team explained to us what they really meant by free SHS for all,” Mr. Oteng underscored.He urged Ghanaians to reject Nana Akufo-Addo and his NPP’s campaign messages if they fail to come out to give a vivid account of what they really meant by free SHS education for all.