The Omanhene of New Juaben Traditional Area, Daasebre Prof.Emeritus Oti Boateng has ordered the Contractor working on a dining hall project at Oti Boateng Senior High School (OBOSS) to provide a makeshift dining hall for the boarding students.
The Omanhene has also collected documents on the said project to follow up in government for the release of funds for the contractor to complete the project in the shortest possible time.
The decision was taken during an emergency traditional council meeting at Omanhene’s Palace to understand the enormity of the dining infrastructural challenge facing the school which has triggered an uproar among old students.
In attendance at the emergency meeting were the Headmaster of the school John Hawkson Arthur and the Contractor.
Omanhene of New Juaben Traditional Area Daasebre Prof. Emeritus Oti Boateng has been strongly criticized for abandoning Oti Boateng Senior High School, a school he renamed from Koforidua Secondary School after himself for aggrandizement amidst controversy in 2011.
Critics of the Omanhene say, since renaming the school after himself, he has not lobbied nor initiated a single project for the school.
Currently, over 600 boarding students of Oti Boateng Senior High School in Koforidua, the Eastern Regional Capital are struggling to get a convenient place to dine after their old wooden structured dining hall was demolished years ago for construction of a multipurpose dining hall project but abandoned at the foundation stage.
The Students dine in turns under trees. Dinning is disrupted whenever it rains.
The onset of the rainy season forecasts a worsened disruptive and miserable dining experience for boarding students in the school.
The students had no dining chairs, therefore, stand to eat.
The risk of birds on the trees flying over their heads and pooing into meals amidst shrieking sounds is discomforting to many of the students hence take away meals served to their dormitories and classrooms as well as the corridors to eat.
The situation is breeding bedbugs, cockroaches, and other insects in the dormitories.
Meals are prepared in a makeshift kitchen constructed on the football field of the school after they were displaced by the construction of the dining hall.
Oti Boateng SHS formerly Koforidua Senior High School (KOSSEC), was established 29 years ago.
The school has been upgraded to a grade “A” status due to its academic feat. However, the school is faced with infrastructural challenges owing to an exponential increase in students’ population due to the implementation of the Free Senior High school policy.
The Old Students Association of the School is unhappy about the situation in the school calling on the government to ensure that the contractor returns to the site to complete the project stating that it should be an emergency due to the pending raining season.
Completion of a storey classroom project by a different contractor has however partly ameliorated the congestion in classrooms but the dining hall remains a major challenge.
Michael Akrofi who spoke on behalf of the old Students also expressed disappointment in Omanhene of New Juaben Traditional Council for not lobbying and adding his voice to the plight of the school he renamed after himself.
Source: Mybrutfmonline.com/Obed Ansah
