[ 2017-03-14 ]

President Akufo-Addo

Free SHS will be poorly funded and fail - IFS
Government's ambitious program to fund the free
SHS policy in September 2017 will impose an
unnecessary burden on government's finances, a
policy think tank has suggested.

The Institute of Fiscal studies believes the
policy risks being poorly funded if government
goes ahead to roll out the program later this
year.

The lead economist with the Institute Leslie
Dwight Mensah would rather the policy is deferred
to at least the next three years by which time
government would have reasonably minimized the gap
between expenditure and revenue which has left in
its wake a humongous debt burden.

The Institute is the next to criticise
government's decision to implement the policy this
year. The first was the Pro-vice Chancellor of the
University of Cape Coast who believed the
government was not ready to execute the project.

Prof. George Kwaku Oduro in an interview with Joy
News said the current situation at the Senior High
Schools was nothing to write home about and that
the situation was likely to be compounded with a
free SHS policy.

"You get to so many schools, particularly those in
disadvantaged context their labs are empty, they
don't have libraries. So if access is given
through free SHS and these schools remain with
empty labs and empty libraries then it compromises
quality," he argued.

But the Minister of Education in a fierce rebuttal
said it was hypocritical that the Pro Vice
Chancellor will be criticizing a policy which was
implemented 50 years ago and which people
benefitted from.

"Where was the Pro-Vost when free SHS started some
50 years ago in this country? Has he ever advised
that those part of the country enjoying free SHS
should be stopped?

"I find it hypocritical that some people are
enjoying free SHS even though it is with
constraints and when a government is taking a bold
step to remove that financial barrier a pro-vost
will say some people should wallow in ignorance.
The president in what appeared to be a bold move
to honour a campaign promise said the free SHS, a
policy initiative that was the major campaign
mantra since 2008 would be executed in September
this year.

There were issues with the cost of funding and
which source of funds will be used to execute the
policy.

That appeared to have been resolved with the
promise by the Finance Minister to use the Annual
Budget funding arrangement as well as other major
government finance sources to execute the
project.

The government budgeted an amount of 400 million
cedis for the implementation of the project but
critics believe that amount will not be enough to
implement the policy and have called for better
targeting of students who will be in need of the
policy.

Prof George Kwaku Oduro believes if proper due
diligence is not done the policy will have dire
consequences on the country's education.

But the UCC Pro Vice Chancellor and the Institute
of Fiscal Studies are not the only the only ones
criticizing the policy.

Head of the Economics Department at the University
of Ghana Professor Peter Quartey also believes a
lot more needs to be done before the policy is
implemented.

He explained while the cost of funding may be
importing his biggest problem is the issue of
targeting.

He does not understand why the government will
seek to execute a policy that will fund the rich
kids whose parents have the capacity to pay for
it.

He would rather the issue of targeting is
fundamentally resolved before government goes
ahead to execute the policy.

Source - Myjoyonline.com

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