Executive director of the Institute for Education Studies (IFEST), Dr Peter Anti, has commended the ministry of education on its prioritization of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) within the education sector.

Assessing government’s performance within the sector, Dr Anti stated that although it has been “challenging” for the government, especially on the education front, there have been lots of improvement in that area. He equally lauded the ministry on its resolve to ensure the success of the education sector.

“I’m talking about improvement in infrastructure, access to education at the secondary level, technical and vocational education, science and technology – which seems to be the highlight for the ministry of education. You see there’s been conscious efforts from the ministry to ensure that STEM is placed up.”
Dr Peter Anti

Furthermore, Dr Anti indicated that there has equally been improvement in the curriculum development process, albeit not perfect. He noted that the country has witnessed changes in curriculum from the primary, junior high school and the senior high schools – which is something government needs to be commended.

That notwithstanding, Dr Anti expressed that though there’s been considerable works done, in the midst of these improvements, “we have seen challenges emanating from the handling of the feeding situation in our various secondary education level”.

He explained that there have been various instances where schools had to complain of shortage of food coupled with directives from school authorities threatening to close down schools due to food shortages.

“… That is a big worry because while you’re doing some of the good things, these things come in and they can be a stumbling block to the progress that you’re making as a country… This year we saw a lot of complaints coming from teachers in terms of their total welfare…”
Dr Peter Anti

GAWU laments state of Ghanaians

On his part, General secretary of the Ghana Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU), Edward Kareweh, bemoaned the plight of Ghanians in the country.

He revealed that “everything has gone wrong” and government has “lost control”. To this end, he highlighted that government must accept that things are not going right and see how it can reverse the situation.

“Certainly, life is very hard, and we just don’t see what is being done to address the problem… I’ve just had the opportunity to travel out of the country and I just see that Ghana is a joke… We sit in Ghana, talk and fight over pettiness and issues that do not promote development. We implement policies that really destroys our people and sometimes I ask why we do this to our own people.”
Edward Kareweh

Touching on government’s agreement with the IMF, Mr Kareweh revealed that the solution to Ghana’s problems is not IMF. He noted that there are alternative means of addressing the country’s problem without the need for an IMF programme.

“… Because of the IMF, look at the fight that we have gotten – the [domestic debt exchange programme]. Today, you can’t see that Ghana is united.”
Edward Kareweh

Cote D’Ivoire has pegged its cocoa producer price at 11%, as against Ghana’s price of 25%. Commenting on this, Mr Kareweh stated that this isn’t something farmers must celebrate. He explained that when the Ghanaian farmer considers his income vis-a-vis high expenditure, he is not better off than the Ivorian farmer.

He admitted that although the Ghanaian farmer’s income is higher than that of the Ivorian farmer, cost of living in Ghana is high, thereby watering down the impact of such increment.