Mr. Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa
The former Deputy Education Minister under the democratically ousted regime of the Mahama-led National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr. Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa, says that if, indeed, President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo were serious about his desire to implement his fee-free Senior High School policy initiative, he would have finished building the 200 Senior High Schools that former President John Dramani Mahama promised but did not even quarter-complete during the four-and-half protracted years that he grossly mismanaged the affairs of the country (See “ ‘Akufo-Addo Could’ve Used 18 Months to Complete Mahama’s 200 Schools’ – Ablakwa” Atinkaonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 7/27/18).
First of all, the North-Tongu NDC-MP needs to explain to the general Ghanaian public why he believes that a project that could not be completed by his former boss in 4 years ought to have been completed by his successor in less than half of the time that then-President Mahama was at the helm of the country’s affairs. He may not have realized it when he made the foregoing snide remark, but what Ablakwa is clearly implying here is that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) is a hard-headed politically and economically elitist party that does not give a hoot about the plight of the abjectly deprived and downtrodden but hardworking and law-abiding Ghanaian citizen.
This is also the more reason why the NDC ought to be kept in opposition for at least 20 years, if the far more progressive leaders of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) are to be able to auspiciously work around the clock to expeditiously move the country forward. Well, for the information of those of our readers who may not know this, the Mahama regime was able to complete less than 25-percent of the 200 Senior High School physical plants that it pontifically promised to erect during its 4-and-half-year tenure.
Mr. Ablakwa, not surprisingly, also does not seem to see anything wrong with the fact that his left-leaning populist party and government cares absolutely nothing about the imperative need and/or inalienable right of every Ghanaian child who qualifies to be able to gain entry into and access upon graduation from middle school or junior high school into a senior high school in order to better her/his chances of making a comfortable living in the near future.
That responsibility, in the warped imagination and opinion of Mr. Ablakwa, squarely belongs to the leaders of the New Patriotic Party. Mr. Ablakwa can also not credibly talk about the soon-to-be implemented Two-Tracked System or the Semester System as a policy initiative that is bound to significantly lower the quality of Ghana’s public education, because the NDC has the worst record of any government in the postcolonial history of the country. For example, an OECD (Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development) survey conducted about 6 or 7 years ago, had Ghana ranking 146 out of the 146 countries that participated in the aforementioned survey. Raising the average aptitude or intellectual and vocational standard of the average Ghanaian, by facilitating free and open access to our Senior High Schools, therefore, can only ensure that Ghana’s public education system would not continue to be envisaged by the rest of the world as a laughing stock.
If, indeed, the economy of the country is not buoyant enough to adequately support a fee-free Senior High School System, as Mr. Ablakwa claims, it is primarily because Mahama cabinet appointees like the nauseatingly vitriolic critic of the Akufo-Addo Presidency spent their entire period in government thievishly lining their wallets and pockets with double salaries which they did not deserve, and which criminally violated the country’s 1992 Republican Constitution. If political freeloaders like Mr. Ablakwa were well aware of the fact of the annual increase in the population of public school attendees, why hadn’t the NDC operatives responsibly and responsively and wisely accommodated the same by annually increasing the number of physical plants or school buildings in the nearly 30 years that they have dominated Ghanaian politics?
Let’s also not forget for even a split-second that Ghana’s unprecedented Mega-Thief, Mr. Alfred Agbesi Woyome, is a National Democratic Congress’ financier. And for all we know, the North-Tongu NDC-MP may very well have generously benefited from the Woyome Heist, which is why his pontifical promises and all, former President Mahama deliberately failed to retrieve even one pesewa from the Mega-Fraudster, who, by the way, also happens to be a ”clansman” of Mr. Ablakwa.
