President Akufo-Addo is extolling his government’s introduction of the Free Senior High School policy as a program that has transformed the education sector for the better.
He said his long-held priority of ensuring that all students of second-cycle institutions in the country attend school free of charge had resulted in millions of beneficiaries who had gone through the system.
He praised the government’s contribution to technical and vocational education as part of his assessment of the overall impact of the policy.
“There can be no such arguments about the introduction of the Free SHS and free TVET programmes. Another policy that did not have universal approval but I sought to do on coming into office.
“However, I believe this is one of the few occasions where I can use the word ‘transformational’ without any danger of abusing the word. We have transformed education and there can never be a reversal of the fact that some 5.7 million young people have gained access to secondary education who would not have otherwise had the opportunity but for Free SHS,” the president said in his address to the House.
Although the Free SHS policy remains an important social intervention agenda by the outgoing government, fact-check desks and data from the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) dispute the government’s 5.7 million figure.
According to the Ministry of Finance, the total beneficiaries of the Free SHS policy from 2017 to 2024 are 3,135,754. This figure is 2,564,246 lower than the 5.7 million President Akufo-Addo.
The assessment was conducted by the Media Foundation for West Africa’s ‘FactCheckGhana’ project.
During the just ended campaign season, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) flag bear, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia and his surrogates repeated the disputed claim.
The Bawumia campaign made the policy a cornerstone as part of its manifesto pledge, arguing that the opposition would terminate it if they were successful in the polls.
President-elect John Mahama has insisted that he will keep the policy in place when he takes office in the coming week.
