Teachers allowance back in first NPP budget - Sammy Awuku

The National Youth Organiser of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr. Sammy Awuku, has said that the first budget of the Nana Addo-led administration would capture the allowances of teacher and nursing trainees.

The allowances, which were scrapped by the outgoing National Democratic Congress (NDC) government, was met with strong resistance from the teacher trainees, who complained bitterly about the difficulties it had brought upon them. The excuse given by the NDC government for embarking on such an action was that it would help the government create more of such institutions to enroll more people, as the government could use the huge amount of money it paid as allowances to establish more of such institutions.

Also, the outgoing Vice President, Paa Kwesi Amissah Arthur, once defended that restoring the allowances would threaten the future of Ghana’s economy. He further told students of the Nalerigu Nursing and Midwifery College in the Northern Region, to disregard promises by the then opposition NPP to restore the allowances, citing that it would not be in the interest of the state.

Following persistent protests by the students from the affected training institutions, the government was compelled to set up a committee, which recommended that the students be met halfway. Subsequently, the government started paying GH¢150 to each of the nursing-trainees in the heat of the election campaign, but the teacher- trainees were left out.

Meanwhile, the NPP, prior to this year’s elections, assured students of the various teacher and nursing training institutions of the party’s commitment to bring back the allowances, to ensure they had smooth training to serve the country.

That notwithstanding, the promise of the NPP was rubbished by communicators of the NDC, including the Vice President, who said the future of the country would be jeopardised if the allowances were restored.

However, speaking with the media at the Alisa Hotel in Accra yesterday, Mr. Sammy Awuku reiterated the promise of the next government to restore those allowances. He noted that the first budget of the NPP would have in it the allowances and other interventions, to enable corporate Ghana also get support to grow.

On the other hand, the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the NPP met yesterday at the Alisa Hotel for the first after winning the elections. Though there was no official press briefing, checks by this reporter revealed that the leadership of the party reminded themselves of the need to help the President-elect Nana Addo and the party to be able to carry out its promises made in its manifesto.