I beg to differ, Ghana’s Constitution permits Mahama to cancel the Free SHS, if he so wishes!

I would like to wade into the ongoing interesting public discourse on whether any future leader who does not like the idea of free secondary education can consciously abandon the well-received Free SHS policy implemented by the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia administration in 2017.

My dear reader, unfortunately, the free secondary education is subject to the availability of resources, therefore, any leader who does not fancy the seemingly advantageous policy could well put forward a flimsy excuse of lack of resources and cancel the policy accordingly.

Take, for example, Article 38(3) of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution stresses that the state shall, ‘subject to the availability of resources’ provide equal and balanced access to secondary education and other pre-tertiary education.

Indubitably, article 38(3) is suggesting that, in the event of a lack of resources, there would be no equal and balanced access to basic education.

If you may recall, during the 2016 electioneering campaign, former President Mahama was captured on tape emitting vehemently: “Hey! That Ghana must not introduce Free SHS on a whimsical promise of a desperate politician”. “Many mistakes have been made by countries in Africa already with Free SHS.”

“The government has budgeted 2 billion cedis for Free SHS for this academic year”. “If you have 2 billion more to spend on education, would you spend all of it on Free SHS, so that even when people can afford to pay, they don’t have to pay?”

The fact, however, remains that the provision of Free SHS is a judicious way in distributing the national resources, which to date, has paved way for more than two million children including those whose parents were in penury and would not have had the opportunity to enter senior high school.

It is worth mentioning that by implementing the Free SHS, the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia administration has estimably upheld the international human rights provision on free universal secondary education, encapsulated in Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economics, Social and Cultural Rights.

In recent times, the sceptics have been questioning the sustainability of the Free SHS implementation due to the obvious challenges. Of course, like any other policy, the Free SHS has its own challenges. However, on the preponderance of probability, the positives outweigh the negatives within the Free SHS implementation.

In the early stages of the policy implementation, the sceptics moved heaven and earth to discredit the policy implementation in order to score cheap political points.

The NDC operatives uncharacteristically sponsored countless adverts and campaigned messages against the poverty reduction Free SHS policy during the 2016 electioneering campaign.

Regrettably, however, no less a person than Ex-President Mahama has been criticising Akufo-Addo/Bawumia administration for implementing the Free SHS policy, allegedly, at the expense of other developmental projects (see: ‘Free SHS crippling other sectors-Mahama, classfmonline.com/ghanaweb.com, 24/02/2018).

Former President Mahama is said to have lamented during one of the NDC’s unity health walks: “The problem this government is facing and it is in their own interest, is that, Free Senior High School is absorbing all the fiscal space they have and so almost every money you have, you are having to put it into Free Senior High School. So you can’t pay District Assemblies Common Fund, you can’t pay NHIS (National Health Insurance Scheme), you can’t pay GET Fund (Ghana Education Trust Fund), you can’t pay other salaries and things because all your money is going into Free Senior High School.”

Given the circumstances, observers can draw the inference that Mahama does not fancy the Free SHS and therefore he is not ready to spend huge amount of money to run the policy.

It would only take a doubting Thomas to challenge the fact that the NDC loyalists, who take pride in the social democratic ideology, are not in the business of promoting the welfare of the masses.

One would have thought that individuals who pride themselves as social democrats will be extremely empathetic to the needs of the masses, but this is not the case with the NDC as a party.

There is no denying or ignoring the fact that the NDC has a penchant for running down or cancelling crucial social interventions. It is a sad case of social democrats who do not know how to initiate and manage social interventions.

It was the erstwhile NDC administration that cancelled/collapsed the Nurse’s Allowance, the Teacher’s Allowance, SADA, GYEEDA, NHIS, the Maternal Care, the School Feeding programme, the Mass Transport System, amongst others.

Based on their track record, it won’t come as a surprise at all, if the future NDC government decides to cancel the Free SHS altogether.

Since the inception of the Fourth Republican Constitution, the self-proclaimed social democrats have been opposing social interventions that have been proposed by the successive NPP governments such as the Free Maternal Care, the NHIS, the Metro Mass Transport, the School Feeding Programme, the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP), , the Free SHS, amongst others.

The opposition NDC operatives attitude towards the Free SHS implementation should be a wake-up call to discerning Ghanaians.

Sometimes, one cannot help but to admire some of our politicians for their incredible dexterity in systematic propagation of propaganda.

What is more pleasing to some of us is that, the social mobility improvement Free SHS policy will at least provide a sound and congenial environment for the students to develop to their full potential and to have a reasonable chance of leading productive and creative lives.

That being said, we cannot vouch for the sustainability of the free SHS policy should Ghanaians make a terrible mistake and hand over the poverty alleviation free SHS programme back to the NDC in the near future.

Our fears stem from the fact that since the implementation of the free SHS policy by the NPP administration, the minority NDC operatives have gathered momentum and called uncountable press conferences with the view to discrediting the policy’s implementation.

Somehow, the minority NDC operatives prefer “progressively free” (whatever that means) to the NPP’s comprehensively free.

Well, they may choose to discredit the Free SHS policy, but the fact remains that the policy will return huge benefits in the long run.

By and large, the vast majority of Ghanaians are benefiting immensely from the policy, including my maternal uncle, Oliver, a diehard NDC supporter, who had earlier criticised the poverty alleviation Free SHS.

But despite my uncle Oliver’s needless and never ending pessimism, he is reaping huge benefits from the Free SHS policy.

It is quite disheartening to witness how some Ghanaians could easily give in to the manipulating politicians vague rhetoric and vile propaganda designed to advance their vested interests.

Somehow, my maternal uncle was amongst the millions of impoverished Ghanaians who were brainwashed by the cunning and manipulating politicians to reject the poverty intervention Free SHS offer during the 2016 electioneering campaign.

Suffice it to stress that if everyone else’s had voted the same way as Uncle Oliver did, I am not sure his three children would have benefited from any free SHS.

I, for one, do not anticipate Uncle Oliver and the likes benefiting from the Free SHS policy should Ghanaians make a terrible mistake and hand over the poverty alleviation Free SHS policy back to the NDC government in the near future.

K. Badu, UK.
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