Caterers who work under the school feeding programme in the Ashanti Region have withdrawn their services over unpaid arrears.
According to the caterers, the government has ignored several appeals to pay their arrears.
They are also pushing for an increase in the feeding grant from GHC0.97 to GHC3 per child.
Some of the caterers lamented that during COVID-19, they cooked for the students, but the government did not pay them in full.
The affected caterers stated that they have consistently demanded their arrears, but nothing has been done about it.
The protest was launched by caterers at the Regional School Feeding Secretariat. They marched to the Ashanti Regional Coordinating Council to present the regional minister, Simon Osei-Mensah, with a petition.
The minister, however, turned his back on the protesters because he was dissatisfied with the caterers’ response to his call for calm. Osei-Mensah and the caterers engaged in a verbal exchange.
“If your child comes to you with chants in demand for a favour, will you be happy? You only brought a petition, why don’t you go ahead,” Osei-Mensah told the caterers who got enraged by his comment.
“Frustrated as we are, we came [to the RCC] to seek the minister’s intervention but that did not happen. We are unhappy with the minister’s conduct. He could have, at least, heard us. This is very weird, to say the least,” one of the caterers said angrily,
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
