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Senior
High Schools in Northern Ghana yet to get Feeding
Grants
By Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, Ghanadot
Accra, Oct 4, Ghanadot -
Senior High Schools (SHSs) in the Northern, Upper
East and Upper West Regions of Ghana are finding it
difficult to run their academic programmes this
year.
This is because the schools in the regions have not
yet had their feeding grants for this academic year.
This came to light when the Northern Patriots in
Research and Advocacy (NORPRA), a civil society
Organization working to promote social equality and
justice, met and appealed to the Upper East Regional
Minister, Mr. Mark Woyongo, to intervene to help
solve the problem.
Briefing the Minister, Mr. Bismark Ayorogo,
President of NORPRA, said it had been established
that most of the heads of the institutions had to
task students to pay their school fees so that it
could be used to help feed them.
As a result, most students who could
not pay their school fees are still at home pending
the disbursement of the school feeding grants.
The President of NORPRA appealed to the Minister to
intervene to solve the problem to enable the
students return to school for academic work and
stressed that the situation had become a perennial
problem that needed to be addressed once and for
all.
Reacting to their concern, Mr. Woyongo said most of
the schools owed food contractors a lot of money and
cited the Bolgatanga Technical School in the Region
as owing a high of three million Ghana cedis.
He revealed that he had directed the District
Director of Education to investigate the matter and
to find a way of solving the problem adding that
because most of the schools were in debt, food
contractors were not interested in supplying food
items to them on credit. He entreated parents not to
shirk their responsibilities of paying their
children's school fees and regretted that instead of
spending on the education of their children, some
parents spent their money on alcoholic beverages.
He stated that he would liaise with his colleague
Ministers in the Northern and Upper West Regions to
make a special case to the government since the area
was the most deprived.
He stressed the need for Government to institute a
special scholarship scheme for students in the
North. He noted that education was one of the major
tools that could help close the gap of development
between the North and the South. He pointed out that
he would contact the Minister of Education on the
issue to ensure that the schools in the area
received their feeding grants in time to facilitate
academic work.
Ghanadot
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