Sissala West District gets first SHS

Gwollu (U/W), May 27, GNA - Mr. Kale Cezar, the Deputy Upper West Regional Minister, has cut the sod for work to start on a senior high sch ool at Gwollu in the Sissala West District.

The project, which is to be executed at a cost of 2,302,244.84 Ghana cedis, comprises a dining hall and a kitchen, a two-storey boys' dormitor y, a two-storey classroom block as well as a two-storey girls' dormitory. The work is expected to be completed within 18 months. Mr. Kale, who performed the ceremony on behalf of Vice President Joh n Dramani Mahama, reiterated government's commitment to expanding education infrastructure in second cycle institutions.

He said the government was convinced that the p rovision of education infrastructure and facilities was the surest way of addressing challenges facing the education sector and not by way of increasing the number of years. Mr Kale said asking students at the SHS level to spend four years without providing them with facilities was simply adding more burden to parents, hence a waste of their scarce resources. He said government would continue to establish new SHS in order to reduce the stress that parents usually go through in search of SHS placem ent for their children. Mr Kale thanked the chief and people of Gwollu for releasing land fo r the project and urged the contractors to quickly move to site to kick sta rt work without any further delay. Mr. Robert Bakah Wavei, the Sissala West District Chief Executive, appealed to the contractors and their workers to establish good relations with the people of the community in order to encourage them to lend them their support. He also cautioned the community members against the stealing of the contractors' items, saying it would bring progress of the work to a standstill. Mr. Wavei however cautioned the contractors against any shoddy work and said the Assembly would monitor the project to ensure the right thing is done. Kuoro Kuri Limann Buktie, Paramount Chief of the Gwollu Traditional Area, thanked government and said the people of the district would remain grateful to government for giving them the first and only SHS since the creation of the district in 2004. He said he would mobilise his people to support the contractors to ensure the completion of the project on schedule.