I won't withdraw remarks against Naana Opoku Agyeman - Education Minister

Minister for Education Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh, has reacted to calls for him to apologise to his predecessor Professor Jane Naana Opoku Agyeman following some slanderous statements he made about the latter after her tenure elapsed.

Dr. Opoku-Prempeh indicated that prior to the implementation of the Free Senior High School policy, the former Education Minister tagged it as a scam, claiming there were no policy documentations to affirm it. He also accused her of indicating on a different platform that the policy was initiated by her government.

“… the former minister against all protocol was on radio station to radio station lambasting the government that she’s seen no policy document, she’s seen no budgetary line for the free SHS and the free SHS is not true. I chose when to answer her…. Two months down the line she comes back and she says after all they started the progressive free shs that we’re continuing, so I said hold on, hold on, the two statements cannot stand. If you started and we’re continuing, then it behooves on you to have produced the document right, where’s your policy document for the progressive free shs,” he queried.

Dr. Opoku-Prempeh described his predecessor’s stance as hypocritical and a propaganda move. “… I was expecting the minister who has been here who has seen the challenges to contribute positively, not to turn into a propaganda outfit of the outgone government.

“… I’m saying that if she touts herself as an educationist which I believe she is and a good professor as that. But her leadership in this ministry as far as fighting for monies to prosecute an agenda of her government is an embarrassment to education, I won’t withdraw my statement and that is it, it’s not a personal statement”, he stressed.

background

Dr Opoku Prempeh, also known as Napo, in a radio interview, called Prof Opoku-Agyemang a “disgrace” and an “embarrassment” for what he termed as her poor performance as a minister.

“Her four-year tenure under John Mahama was an embarrassment" because "she doesn’t understand education”, he told the late KABA on Asempa FM's Ekosii Sen.

But several former government officials of the Mahama administration jumped to Prof. Naana Opoku Agyeman’s defense and lashed out at the incumbent Education Minister, demanding an apology from him.