[ 2017-02-14 ]

Yaw Osafo-Maafo,Senior Minister

Money for free SHS will come from Heritage Fund - Osafo Marfo
Senior Minister, Yaw Osafo Marfo has hinted that
the government’s Free Senior High School policy
will be funded by the Heritage Fund.

The Akufo-Addo government plans to fully implement
the policy from September. President Akufo-Addo
over the weekend said the implementation of his
much touted campaign policy was on course stating
that “by free SHS, we [government] mean that in
addition to tuition which is already free, there
will be no admission fees, no library fees, no
science centre fees, no computer lab fees, no
examination fees, no utility fees, there will be
free textbooks, free boarding and free meals, and
day students will get a meal at school for
free.”

The president’s announcement of the full
enrollment of the policy was, however, met with
stern skepticism as he did not disclose its source
of funding.

The head of Economics at IMANI, Patrick Stephenson
said the policy is likely to face challenges due
to the country’s wobbling financial status.

“I think that’s been the problem to the extent
that we have not seen sufficient clarity from the
current government [and] is making it very
difficult to appreciate what the intended
objectives are,” he told Accra-based Citi FM.

But speaking to Journalists on Tuesday on the
sidelines of a Graphic-Stanbic breakfast forum,
Mr. Marfo down-played the apprehension caused by
the president’s failure to disclose the source
of funding for the policy.

According to him, it will be funded by the
Heritage Fund and that the government is taking a
critical look at the Fund to clear all the legal
bottlenecks that will make it possible to be used
as the main source of funding for the audacious
policy.

“We are going to look at the Heritage Fund—the
Heritage [Fund] implies for the future. We want to
introduce…and the president mentioned it last
week [Free Senior High School] and it is likely to
be Funded through the Petroleum Act [Heritage
Fund,” he said.

That being the case the government will amend the
Act to allocate some portions of the fund to the
implementation of the policy, he added.

A Deputy Education Minister in the erstwhile
Mahama administration said the policy is doable
after scathingly condemning its feasibility during
electioneering in 2012.

“It is doable if we can find the resource,” he
told Nii Arday Clegg, former host of Morning Starr
on Monday, adding: “And that is why I was
hazarding a guess that perhaps they want to make
substantial savings on the construction of these
new secondary schools and then channel those
savings into progressively free programme.”

Source - Starrfmonline.com.

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