Manhean TMA School in deplorable state

The school building of the Tema Manhean TMA School has become a death trap for its 865 pupils and teachers due to its deplorable state.

The school, established in the 1960s, operates the shift system and has never seen any major renovation as the building's painting was completely washed off due to years of neglect.


Pillars erected to hold roofing of the veranda have lost their concrete components leaving rusty rods of iron showing.


While parts of roofing sheets for the veranda was ripped off with others hanging loosely, those of the classroom have big holes in them exposing pupils to the vagaries of the weather thus making learning and teaching very difficult.


Apart from the pupils having to study in dark classrooms, the floors could best be described as potholes while visible structural cracks have also developed on the walls of the classrooms.


Mr Seth Noi, Head teacher of the school, said officials of the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) visited and inspected the state of the school in 2013 and promised to reroof the building but was yet to hear from them.


For the past three years, caterers preparing food for pupils of the school and the Manhean Methodist School under the Ghana School Feeding Programme, operate from a kitchen whose roof has been ripped off.

The kitchen built by the TMA for the schools lost its roof to a rainstorm that hit Tema Manhean some few years back.


Electrical wires were hanging loosely in the roofless room while caterers went about their daily activities of cooking on coal-pots.


Some of the caterers, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they constantly fall sick due to the condition they were working under.


They said by their contract, they had to provide the food for the children daily meaning whether it rained or the sun was too high, they had no choice but to cook in the roofless kitchen.


According to them, even though letters had been written to the TMA, results were yet to be seen.


Some officials of the TMA who visited the school to welcome pupils on 'My first day at school' programme claimed the letters written to the Assembly concerning the kitchen roof were being processed and action would be taken very soon.