Former Upper East Regional Minister under the Mills-Mahama administration, Prof. Ephraim Avea Nsoh has asserted that the NDC will face challenges in implementing its promise to absorb full school fees of newly admitted students for the 2020/2021 academic year.
According to Avea Nsoh, the bureaucratic nature of the government’s agencies which usually lead to delays in the release of government subventions to schools, coupled with the vulnerability of the country’s economic situation will present a challenge to his party’s quest to absorb full fees of fresh tertiary students in the next academic year should it win the December polls.
The former Principal of the College of Language Education, University of Education said, per his long-time experience in the country’s public tertiary institutions, implementing such a policy is a difficult task and thus, it may suffer setbacks.
Mr. Avea Nsoh, who disclosed that he is unaware of such a promise, said for the policy to be implemented without many glitches, then his party will have to put in place responsive measures to check the possible challenges the implementation of the policy may encounter.
“If that (implementation of the policy) has to happen that means we have to put in place serious measures. Because government’s subventions to the universities some times can be delayed for up to 3 months. I cannot guarantee that (there will be funds for the implementation) because the resources in the system may not be what we will come to meet. I know from my long-time in the universities that that is going to be a difficult thing,” he said in an interview on Dreamz FM.
The former aspirant for the NDC Parliamentary candidature for the Bongo Constituency is, however, confident that his party will put in place the necessary measures to ensure smooth implementation of the policy.
He said, unlike the NPP, his party has a track record of implementing well-thought out policies and he believes the NDC has properly thought through the policy before pledging to implement it.
“Any program that we have done, we have always really looked at the various component – how to fund it and who to manage it. That has always been done. We don’t want to look like the NPP and I’m sure if it is true that it was said then it was not just said in the blue that they should just do that,” he added.
The opposition party, in a dramatic move, announced that it has accepted for incorporation into the party’s 2020 manifesto which has already been released a policy recommended by its Education Policy Group.
The policy dubbed ‘Fa Ninyinaa’ will absorb full school fees of students who will be admitted for the 2020/2021 academic year.
A statement signed by Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, National Chairman of the party, said the policy is a modification of the earlier promise by the party to absorb 50 percent of fees of all tertiary students in the next academic year if it wins the December Elections.
The statement further clarified that the promise to absorb 50 percent of schools of tertiary students through a policy dubbed ‘Kyemupe’ will henceforth apply to only continuing tertiary students in the next academic year.
