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GHANA WEATHER

Civil Society worried about state of Ghana’s basic education

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The Centre for Socio-economic Studies has bemoaned the deteriorating state of Ghana’s basic education.

The Centre is specifically worried about the unavailability of textbooks, and other teaching and learning materials for the past two years.

A statement signed by a Research Fellow at the Centre, Albert Wotorgbui noted that since the introduction of the new curriculum for basic schools in September 2019, corresponding textbooks and other teaching and learning materials are yet to be developed, printed and distributed to schools.

He was worried that the total expenditure on education has consistently declined from 19.49 percent of total expenditure in 2017 to 15.98 percent in 2019, 16.08 percent in 2020, and now to a very low budgetary allocation of 12.11percent of total budgetary expenditure for 2021.

Again, the 2021 budgetary allocation of GHC15.63 billion to the Education Ministry is approximately equal to the total expenditure of GHC15.55 billion in 2020; a year in which the total expenditures of the Ghana Book Development Council and the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment were GHC1.37 million and GHC1.23 million.

This insufficient budgetary allocation to both institutions responsible for the development and provision of these textbooks and the accompanying relevant teaching and learning materials yielded no results in 2020.

Mr. Wotorgbui noted that this gross irresponsibility being committed violates the Ghanaian Child’s Right to Education, the United Nation’s Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the Sustainable Development Goal 4, among other such international commitments.

To this end, the Centre is demanding from the Ministry of Education and the Ghana Education Service, an explanation as to why this unfortunate situation has persisted for nearly three years.

It also wants the institutions to take immediate steps to address the situation and also provide Ghanaians with a timeline for the resolution of the problem.

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