A Deputy Ranking Member on the Education Committee Dr. Clement Apaak, has slammed President Akufo-Addo questioning his integrity as a politician.
The legislator says he is shocked that the President is now telling Ghanaians that he will expand the free senior school to include technical and vocational education after disclosing in 2020 it was covered.
He says the president has not been candid and lied to the people hence must apologize for peddling lies.
He disclosed that former President John Dramani Mahama was the first to have promised Ghanaians he would expand free SHS policy to cover technical and vocational education.
But after he made the pledge, the President in his 2020 state of the nation address told Ghanaians TVET was already already covered.
He cited a news story published by ModernGhana which they originally sourced from Citinewsroom to support his claim.
Mr. Mahama on January 17, 2020 promised free Technical and Vocational Education (TVET) at all levels which he believed at the time would help in the training of more skilled human resources for national development.
He also announced the establishment of TVET universities in each of the six newly created regions.
“I’ll make technical and vocational education in Ghana, free of charge. I note that, this has generated a positive reception from Ghanaians. Let me assure that, our program of technical and vocational education are comprehensive and far-reaching. The free TVET will operate from all levels from the second cycle to tertiary.
To be clear, students of technical and vocational education at the second and tertiary level will pay no fees. We must not pay lip service to technical and vocational education. This is the training that will move this country to the next level. So we will bring TVET on board to create the middle-level manpower that will be beneficial to businesses and industries. This is the critical gap my initiative intends to address.”
In that same year when President Akufo-Addo presented his SONA, where he stated that Technical and Vocational Education and Training( TVET) has always been part of government’s flagship programme, Free SHS.
According to the President, his government maintained its focus on improving technical and vocational education in Ghana and to make it free and accessible to all just like the Senior High School education.
But the President on March 2, this year disclosed that his administration will expand the policy to cover TVET.
Reacting to this, Dr. Apaak is questioning why the President would make such comments when he had already informed Ghanaians that the policy was covering TVET.
He wrote “Free TVET – Folks, in January 2020 JM said via a Facebook post that he will make TVET Education at secondary and tertiary levels free, a month after in February 2020, NADAA during the 2020 SoNa responded that TVET was already part of fSHS (see attached article).
Consequently, I was flabbergasted when yesterday March 2nd 2022, NADAA said, “this year (2022) government will expand the free senior high school programme to cover all first-year students in public TVET institutions,”.
If TVET was already part of fSHS as NADAA said during his address to the nation on February 20th, 2020, why is he telling us in March 2022 that fSHS will be expanded to cover TVET? Truth Stands!”
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
