Activate the 'unemployment insurance scheme' to support private teachers - Nana B appeals to Govt

NPP National Youth Organizer, Henry Nana Boakye has called on government to assist private schools and their teaching staff as the closure of some Senior and Junior High, primary and basic schools extends to next year.

President Nana Akufo-Addo, in his 16th nation address on COVID-19 on Sunday, August 30, 2020 annonced that the schools will reopen in January, 2021.

"The Ghana Education Service, after further consultations, has decided to postpone the remainder of the academic year for all nursery, kindergarten, primary, JHS 1 and SHS 1 students. The next academic year will resume in January 2021, with appropriate adjustments made to the curriculum, to ensure that nothing is lost from the previous year. The relevant dispositions will also be made so that the presence, at the same time, in school of all streams of students, can occur in safety."

Noting the decision will inconvenience parents and families, the President appealed to them to bear with the government in these trying times.

''I appreciate fully the inconvenience and the financial burden the continued stay at home of children are posing to parents and guardians. Fellow Ghanaians, these are a necessary price to pay in our efforts to protect the lives of our children, as well as to limit and contain the spread of the virus in our country,'' he said.

Contributing to Peace FM's flagship programme ''Kokrokoo'', Henry Nana Boakye, popularly called Nana B empathized with the private schools and teachers saying they will be most affected by the new directive.

According to him, it is possible the teaching staff in public schools will essentially be remunerated while they stay home but a lot of the teachers in private schools will have to forfeit their salaries.

To him, the private school teaching staff are already suffering major financial challenges since schools were closed months ago when Ghana recorded its first COVID-19 cases, so government must come to their aid.

He appealed to the government to activate the Unemployment Insurance Scheme to cushion the private schools and their teachers as they wait to resume work in January next year.

He believed the scheme can be used to fund the private teachers during this pandemic.

''This is where I'll plead that the Unemployment Insurance Scheme by government to provide temporary income for workers should be activated urgently," he stated.