The Member of Parliament for North Tongu Constituency, Hon. Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has cautioned NPP gov’t to stop insulting the Ghanaian populace by playing with their intelligence for using a clever way to outsmart them with such a partial funding source of their free SHS policy, saying, the NPP are not the smartest people in Ghana.

In an interview with Newslinegh, Hon. Ablakwa disclosed that, though the Finance Minister did not put out any figure during the delivery of his 2017 budget, yet the highlights of the budget statement which was distributed by the NPP official communicators states that, the cost of free SHS will be 400million dollars for the year 2017.

This called for his attention to address the truth in this whole fallacy, he said, this 400million dollars only means that, the NPP cannot provide the comprehensive free SHS education as claimed in their manifesto, but only to continue with the progressively free SHS in line with the article 25(B) of the constitution which the NDC was implementing and opposed by these same NPP smart Alec’s.

This 400million dollars, He said, could only fund the 1st year of the project and per our consecutive estimation, Ghana will even need not less than 3.1billion dollars to fund a free SHS.

According to him, even before the NDC left power, they had committed to building One hundred, Twenty three senior high schools with Seventy seven outstanding, where they wrote to the chiefs and have already donated lands, waiting for these Seventy seven schools to be completed, yet nothing was said about it in the 2017 budget and this is a clear indication that there’s no policy for it, which will destroy Ghanaian education, where quality is going to suffer all because of one monstrous promise made by the NPP.

This monstrous promise which was not well thought through, which was not properly planned and programmed will be the downfall of Ghana’s educational system. He emphasized.

He reiterated that, the Finance Minister Ken Ofori created more confusing surrounding the Free SHS promise, with lots of controversies earlier, but today Ghanaians have been given a partial funding source of the Free SHS policy, saying the ABFA and other domestic revenue sources, and refused to tell Ghanaians who these domestic sources are, meanwhile, everyone is aware the ABFA won’t be enough to fund such a project.

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“ Another mystery which the NPP has to help us unravel is the creation of the education fund. If they say they don’t want parents to contribute to their children’s education and that they are going to fund a comprehensive SHS free of charge, then there’s no need of creating this fund which they are expecting parents, Alumni and other groups to contribute to this so-called education fund”.

“I am therefore calling on the NPP to come clean and tell Ghanaians that yes, we got it all wrong, we can’t fund it, we can’t find the money or the funding source, it’s also not a sustainable promise and so whoever can contribute should do so and let’s continue with the NDC approach of targeting. Targeting the deprived as we move on”. He lamented.

“ As an MP, he said, I had all along thought the One Million dollars per Constituency was a stand alone promise, One District One factory is a stand alone promise, One village One Dam is also a stand alone promise, but today, it has emerged that all of these promises comes under the acclaimed ‘ One million dollars for the constituencies. This is a huge deception and that is why we, the minority are calling this budget a 419 budget”.

“The NPP are now using a clever way to achieve a promise that can’t be fulfilled, as If Ghanaians are not discerning and when they do that, then they are insulting Ghanaians. NPP should stop insulting Ghanaians because they are not the smartest people in this country. Everyone can see through their deceptions” Hon. Okudzeto Ablakwa has said.

By: Blessing Roselyn Boateng

 

Exclusively Newslinegh