Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has said his administration would help address the wide disparity between the rich and the poor in accessing tertiary education in the country.
He said his government would embark on massive expansion of educational infrastructure at the basic school through to the tertiary level across a 10-year period as well as establish a school to serve each community across the country.
Nana Akufo-Addo was responding to a question by a participant at an interaction with some members of professional bodies in Sunyani as part of his campaign tour in the Brong–Ahafo Region. The tour is dubbed "RESTORING HOPE".
The NPP flagbearer’s team is also scheduled to hold meetings with the electorate in parts of the region.
The tour to the Region, which started on July 3, has taken the NPP Presidential candidate to Mehame, Dadiesoaba, Nkaseim, Fienkyemu and Hwidiem. It is expected to end on July 8, 2012.
The meeting with members of the professional bodies was aimed at tapping their inputs and sharing ideas on how to move the nation forward.
Nana Akufo-Addo reiterated the need to find lasting solutions to the “age old tradition and practice” of polytechnic teachers embarking on strikes to back their demands for better conditions of service.
“It is important to ensure a systemic overhaul of the whole structure, an important challenge that requires the NPP replacing the NDC in government to effect the right and necessary changes on the way things are done”, he said.
Nana Akufo-Addo indicated there was a critical need to address the longstanding impasse between teachers, especially those in polytechnics and the government, as their roles and contributions were very significant and paramount to the industrial transformation of Ghana’s economy.
He said upon assumption of power, the NPP government would transform the polytechnics into colleges of technology and put special emphasis and premium on such institutions by bringing new changes and improvement in areas such as budget control and syllabus.
The NPP flagbearer called for a discussion to enable the people to build consensus and find new perspectives to help address pertinent issues and concerns bordering on polytechnic education in the country.
He said it was also his objective to nip in the bud the phenomenon where access to quality education was restricted to a selected few who could afford, have the contacts and connections with some individuals and institutions.
He noted that these practices only helped to manage and enforce the class nature in the educational sector thereby denying the poor good quality education.
Nana Akufo-Addo emphasized his administration would ensure education was made accessible to every child in Ghana, irrespective of economic and financial standing.
“Free Senior High School is important for the future of Ghana. We are fully committed to broadening access to education at first and second cycle institutions and how to motivate the National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT) and other professional teachers, including their terms and conditions of service so children can have the requisite training in education”, he said.
Nana Akufo-Addo added, it was part of the NPP’s manifesto and gave the promise that teachers would be assisted by the central government to buy personal houses for use during retirement as part of their meritorious contributions and service to the nation.
He stated that the NPP when voted into power would do all it could to resource farmers with credit to enable them to improve their businesses and channel funds to where they were needed to avoid wastage in the system.
Nana Akufo-Addo said the current happenings at the Ministry of Justice and Attorney’s General Department where a sector Minister and his deputy have different stances on the payment of judgment debt in the Woyome saga, was an “aberration” in President Mills' administration.
He emphasized the need to strengthen state legal systems to help entrench the rule of law, adding “there is the urgent need to adequately expand, resource and recruit the scope of the people there”.
Replying to a question on the increasing cost of production and its adverse effects in the poultry industry, Mr. Akobour Debrah, MP for Tano North, said there was the need to modernize the industry in order to reduce cost of production.
“This is vital because the world has become a global village and if that is not done, one cannot compete effectively on the international market”, he said, stressing the need to add value to the production of broilers to make up for the high protein consumption, which stood at 20 to 35 per cent.
Mr. Kwadwo Adjei Darko, former Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, asked Ghanaians to disabuse their minds about furthering their education at the university level after pursuing polytechnic education.
“Such attitude turns to make the universities superior to polytechnics and defeats the purpose for which the polytechnics were set up and the law establishing them since they (polytechnics) are practical-oriented institutions designed to run at par with the Universities.
“All that we want to do is to try as much as possible to enable people who want to attain as high as obtaining a PhD degree at the polytechnic to do so and not necessarily switch over to a public university”, he added.
Nana Akufo-Addo is to continue his tour to Goaso and Mim in Ahafo part of Brong–Ahafo Region.**
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