Former President and 2024 NDC flagbearer, John Mahama, has urged the government and other stakeholders in the education sector to consciously provide a conducive environment for private schools to thrive.
He observed that both public education and private education are partners to complement each other because the government does not have all it takes to be the sole investor in providing quality education for the Ghanaian people and would somehow need the private sector.
“Because the government does not have the resources to be the sole investor in quality education for our children, we need to leverage the capacity of the private sector to also do that,” he stated.
Mr. Mahama was speaking against the backdrop of the government’s free senior high school (FSHS) policy, which he believes is threatening the existence of private schools in the country.
He said he witnessed a special case in Jomoro, somewhere in the Western Region, where pupils from government schools who obtained good grades in their Basic Education Certification Examination are admitted into good government secondary schools.
According to him, most parents withdraw their children from private basic schools when they are in their final year and enrol them in public schools to allow them to enjoy the benefits associated with the FSHS policy, leaving the private school with a significantly reduced number of students.
The former president said that the trend is worrying, as it is collapsing the investments of people who have established such schools to provide formal education to Ghanaians.
“Private sector education was with us before public sector education came into existence, for if you take the history of education in Ghana from the early schools in the castles and the schools that were established by rich men, these were not public schools but private sector schools, and so public sector schools came to meet private sector schools, and so you are the elder brothers of education in this country,” Mr. Mahama stressed.
He therefore told the government not to overburden the schools in the private sector with so much tax that their very survival is threatened.
The Former President made these comments during the launch of this year’s Ghana National Association of Private Schools (GNAPS) week celebration in Accra on February 28th, 2024.
He added that it was due to the important role that private sector education plays in the country that the Education Act of 1961 provided the framework for the operations of private schools in Ghana, adding that the 1992 constitution of Ghana, under Article 25(2), guarantees every person the right to establish and maintain a school at all levels.
He said most kindergarten schools are established and maintained by the private sector, which gives children basic foundational training before their actual learning begins.
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