The National Communications Officer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) says it doesn’t matter the “lies” the New Patriotic Party (NPP) will churn out about who introduced the Free Senior High School (SHS) programme but the facts are there to show that former president John Mahama did.
Sammy Gyamfi stressed that his party’s flagbearer launched the programme in 2015 with fees of over 360,000 day students absorbed.
At a press conference in Accra on Thursday, November 26, Sammy Gyamfi said the launch five years ago was even followed with the procurement of over 306 million textbooks.
Besides, the “full implementation of it including boarding students has been made possible as a result of the over 46 community day secondary schools,” he added.
At the press conference, Sammy Gyamfi pulled a tweet of then candidate Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo commending then President Mahama for the implementation of the programme.
“Ironically, President AKufo-Addo who says that he is surprised that [former] President Mahama or anybody will suggest that it was the Mahama/NDC government which introduced free SHS in 2015, actually lauded and applauded John Dramani Mahama in 2015 when he launched Free SHS.”
Sammy Gyamfi, however, commended the New Patriotic Party (NPP) for continuing the policy and said what they need to do is to give credit where it is due.
“So our friends in NPP must learn to give credit where credit is due. You came, met a programme which had already been launched, day students in this country over 360,000 of them were not paying school fess, you came and continued it, which is good because governance is a continuum but don’t claim credit for something you did not start. Don’t say you started it when you did not.”
There has been raging debate as to which government started the Free SHS.
While former president Mahama insists he started it in 2015, President Akufo-Addo said he started it and that Mr Mahama’s pronouncements against the programme then makes his current stance strange.
But Minister of Information Kojo Oppong Nkrumah says the millions of beneficiaries of the policy know who started it.
The millions of Ghanaians impacted by the free shs program do not have short memories. They know it was envisioned and started by @NAkufoAddo. They will speak on Dec 7.
— Kojo Oppong Nkrumah (@konkrumah) November 26, 2020
Source: 3news.com|Ghana