Where is the $1.5 billion while we have uncompleted schools? – Apaak questions government
The Minority caucus in Parliament has revealed that they will commence a probe into the $1.5 billion security that was approved for the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFUND) for the completion of critical educational facilities.
In 2018 Parliament approved the $1.5 billion loan for the GETFund to support the development of educational infrastructure.
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) legislators, insisted that they could not back the loan agreement because they were unaware of the lender of the facility.
But the then Minister of Monitoring and Evaluation Dr Anthony Osei Akoto said the Minority members had been informed about the lender.
He went ahead to announce to the House who the lender was – CAL Bank.
“Mr Speaker, let us be honest with ourselves, other than that, we will be setting examples that we cannot continue to follow” he added.
But the Minority, despite boycotting the passage, say they will probe the loan facility.
Dr Clement Apaak, Deputy Ranking Member, Education Committee of Parliament told the press after a tour of some uncompleted projects in the country on Tuesday, October 19, 2021, that “We are all aware of the inadequacy of infrastructure which is why the obnoxious double-track system was introduced.
“So, when we have structures like this, 90 per cent complete, at a cost of 9 million cedis and yet we cannot complete it for students to have access to education, for classroom sizes to be reduced, for communities to have hope that their wards are going to benefit from the free senior high school, clearly, we cannot forgive government.
“Because the 1.5 billion dollars that GETFund was securitised to obtain was supposed to help complete what they themselves described as essential educational infrastructure and they indicated in their memo to Parliament that was to address the increased number of students who have come on stream as a result of the coming into being of the free SHS policy, so why is this here.
“Is it that we don’t have the money? What have they done with the $1.5 billion that we securitised the GETFund for? Is it not time they come to Parliament to account for how many of the critical educational infrastructure they have completed so that we know there is value for money in a community such as this which doesn’t even have a secondary school. Is it fair?”
By: Stella Annan | myactiveonline.com Twitter @activetvgh
