The President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has directed the Minister for Education, Hon. Matthew Opoku Prempeh, to engage the Ghana Education Service (GES) to reconsider its decision to ban some fourteen (14) dismissed final year senior high school students from taking the ongoing West African Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE).
Even though the acts of indiscipline undertaken by these students are intolerable, acts which have led to their subsequent dismissal from school, President Akufo-Addo is of the firm view that dismissal alone is enough punishment, and will serve as enough deterrent against future acts of indiscipline.
The President believes that everyone deserves a second chance in life, and is, thus, hopeful that the students will be allowed by the GES to take their final examinations as scheduled. Indeed, all other punishment imposed by the relevant authorities should remain in place.
Meanwhile, Mr. John Mahama, Presidential Nominee of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) for this year’s elections has attributed the unruly behavior of some current West Africa Senior School Certificate Examinations (WASSCE) candidates to the decision by the government to buy past questions for them.
He said that the WASSCE candidates believed that the past questions bought for them by the government would come during the exams hence their disappointment and the kind of behavior they put up.
Mr. Mahama made this point when he called on the Overlord of Dagbon, Ya-Na Mahama Abukari (II) at his palace at Yendi.
Mr. Mahama said during his tenure and under his Minister of Education, Professor Jane Nana Opoku-Agyemang, who is his running mate for the elections, “Ghana saw the best WASSCE results. Ghana saw the best BECE results in our history.”
He explained that “All of us pass O’Level and A’Level. We used to go to the West Africa Examinations Council to buy past questions ourselves. The government never gave it to us.
And we bought it because you can look at the past questions and they can help you to rehearse towards the exams but when the government goes and buys it and gives it to them, it gives them the idea that these are the questions that are going to come.
And they go and sit in the exams hall and those questions they studied for are not in the paper, then this is the kind of thing you will see happening.”
He said “We will come back to the government. We will make sure that our children are well prepared and well-taught so that they will go into that exams hall with confidence and not feel that the only way they can pass is to cheat in the examinations.”
Source: Mybrytfmonline/Kofi Atakora
