Appoint minister to address educational issues - GNAT urges govt

The Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) has called for the urgent appointment of a Minister of Education to help address the challenges bedevilling the sector.

It said considering the challenges, it was only proper for an Education Minister to have been nominated among the first three ministerial nominees announced by the President on Thursday, January 9, 2025.

The General Secretary of GNAT, Thomas Tanko Musah, told the Daily Graphic in an interview that the issues, including the current food situation in senior high schools (SHSs) and some challenges in basic schools, did not speak well of the country.

Delay

“It (the appointment of a minister) must be done without delay because what is happening on the educational front now is not the best. You get up, you hear this one, you hear that one. I don't think it's good for us; and before the international community, it's also not good,” he said.

Aside from the feeding challenge in SHSs, he cited the delay in the release of the capitation grant for basic schools in the country and feeding under the school feeding programme as other pressing issues that needed immediate attention.

He said funds needed to run educational offices were also not forthcoming, not to talk of the government’s indebtedness to the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) that resulted in the late release of the 2024 West African Senior School Certificate Education (WASSCE) for School Candidates results.  

Mr Musah said the Children’s Act (Section 2) indicated that the interest of the child should be paramount in any matter that had to do with children.

He said schoolchildren were having challenges with food and wondered whether they would have to wait until a substantive minister was appointed since the food issue was a policy matter. 

Substantive

“Now, does it mean that these children will have to wait until a substantive minister is appointed? Unfortunately, when the first three ministers were mentioned, that of education was not part.

“Technically speaking, I was thinking a minister designated for education should have been part, given the current challenges confronting us in education,” he emphasised.

National Education Review Conference

Mr Musah emphasised that the issues affecting the education sector were policy matters, hence the need for the nomination of a minister by now.

“There are problems at the SHS level and all that, so the minister must come in as quickly as possible to help get things done because most of the things we are talking about are policy matters,” he explained.

Asked about the National Education Review Conference to be hosted by the government as announced by President John Mahama, he said GNAT was all for it though that was also a policy matter.

“Without a substantive minister, you cannot hold it. We have already said that feeding is a policy matter. That consultative forum is a policy matter because, at the end of the day, all the issues that will come out from that particular forum will have to go to Cabinet,” he said.

NCPTAs

Meanwhile, the National Council of Parent-Teacher Associations (NCPTA) has called for the closure of senior high schools (SHSs) until the issue of feeding and other pressing matters are addressed.

The NCPTA said nothing was currently working in the senior high schools since they reopened on Friday, January 3, 2025.

"Nothing is working in the schools. All the assurance from the previous government that they will support with feeding, they will provide funds for feeding and all those things are not there," the General Secretary of the NCPTAs, Raphael Kofi Gapson, had said.

CHASS warning

Ahead of the reopening date, the Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) had appealed to the Ghana Education Service (GES) to postpone the reopening of schools until the government had settled the outstanding debt for food and operations.

In a statement issued on December 31, 2024, the school heads said the government failed to respond to three appeals they had made since August 2024 for payment of arrears covering perishables, recurrent fees and food transportation costs.

The National Secretary of CHASS, Baro Primus, therefore, directed all regional branches to notify parents of the potential delay through parent associations.