NDC’s ideological school bruhaha - Are the party leaders serious?

On the 16th of August, 2017, I read an article on peacefmonline under the caption “No NDC School Certificate, No Appointment” in which the Deputy General secretary of the party in the person of Koku Anyidoho was reported to have said amongst other things that, any member of the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) who fails to go to the party’s ideological school, cannot run for president or get any appointment in a future NDC government.

I also, read another news article on the 14th of August, 2017 titled “We Don’t Need Any Accreditation to Run Our School – NDC Tells NAB” In that article, the National Organizer of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Kofi Adams is purported to have said that, “the NDC is free to operate its National Institute of Social Democracy School without acquiring the necessary accreditation from the National Accreditation Board (NAB)”.

I find these comments very interesting and amusing for the simple reason that, the NDC is made up of fine brains, Doctors, Professors and other ordinary men and women who have acquired quite significant levels of education, training, and certification.

I therefore, expected that those with such requisite experience on education and academic issues will tutor these party leaders and win them from this ignorance. If they care to know, National Accreditation Board (NAB) was established under the Act, 2007 (Act 744) operationalized by the Tertiary Institutions (Establishment and Accreditation) Regulations, 2010 (L.I 1984), and it is the sole body vested with the authority to accredit tertiary education institutions and their programmes in Ghana.

By accreditation, it means validation of course syllabus and programmes in which colleges, universities and other institutions of higher learning are evaluated against well-established standards.

These standards for accreditation are set by a peer review board whose members include faculty from various accredited colleges and universities to ensure that, the syllabus run by any institution is streamlined to avoid sub-standard courses or programmes which could invariably pollute the products of such institutions.

The NDC’s decision not to recognize the NAB and its mandate means that they are not ready for review of their courses or programmes. Interestingly, the purpose of the Ideological Institute is to train party members who will win power one day to govern the country Ghana.

My question is what do they want to teach these party followers in their so called Ideological Institute? Worse of it is the statement from the Deputy General Secretary that, if any member does not get trained and certificated by that unaccredited school, such a person cannot be hired by a future NDC government to work for mother Ghana! Interesting right? Which body will supervise that, certification? Who will ensure that what the so called ideological kingpins are teaching is right?

I am asking these questions bearing in mind that, the NDC has ruled Ghana for at least 16years; and in all their tenure, they failed woefully to churn out one social intervention programme.

When asked of Asiedu Nketia (aka General Mosquito) by Akosua on THE HARDTRUTH on joy news why the NDC failed to live their ideology, he only laughed sarcastically, and told the host that, if another party buys into another’s philosophy and does the good thing is a plus for the one who muted the ideology! Really? Well….! I hold a different view. And my view is that, either the NDC does not understand their own philosophy or do not understand how to ‘practicalize’ their own ideology.

So I ask again, what do they want to teach their party faithful at the ideological school? An ideology they themselves do not understand or an ideology which only exists on paper? Your guess is good as mine!!!