Government urged to address early release of feeding grants

Tamale, June 3, GNA - The government has been urged to address the recurrent problems militating against the early release of school feeding grants to Senior High Schools (SHS) in the three Northern Regions to avoid future disruptions of the academic calendar in boarding institutions.

Mr Charles K. Nyaabu, Northern Regional Chairman of the Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools, (CHASS), made the appeal at a meeting with the Northern Regional Minister, Alhaji Mustapha Ali Idris, heads of boarding institutions and food suppliers in Tamale on Tuesday. The meeting, which was at the instance of the Regional Minister was to provide them a platform to discuss problems associated with the release of the school feeding grants and other matters on payment of debts incurred by the school authorities and the food suppliers. The meeting was also to thank the Northern, Upper East and Upper West Regional Ministers for their interventions in ensuring the release of the School Feeding grants.

Mr Nyaabu said the recurrent delays in releasing feeding grants to the schools was negatively imparting on the academic performance of SHS students in the three regions, which were already disadvantaged in terms of educational development in the country. Mr Nyaabu said for the past five weeks, students of boarding institutions in the three regions had been at home because government had not released their feeding grants. He said the delay in releasing the feeding grants also created problems between the school heads and food suppliers and does not give the school authorities the opportunity to explore other avenues of getting cheaper food supply.

The CHASS Chairman said government had released the outstanding second term feeding grants for schools, whilst efforts were being made for the release of the third term grants. He said to enable the students catch up with their counter-parts in the south in their studies SHS in the north would extend their academic calendar to the August 25, 2008, instead of March 25, this year when their counterparts in the south would have gone on vacation. He assured that, both teachers and students would work extra hard to enable the students completed their syllabuses. He thanked the food suppliers for their understanding to continue to supply the schools with food items despite the debts the schools owe them.

Alhaji Idris urged the school heads not to always allow the situation of the release of feeding grants reached a critical period before asking for its release. He asked them to try to always submit early returns for the feeding grants, so that they were released on time to avoid disruption of the academic calendar of the schools. The Regional Minister suggested to the food suppliers to form an association to enable them effectively discussed their problems with the school authorities.