A former Health Minister, Alexander Segbefia, has emphasized the need to review the government’s Free Senior High School (SHS) policy to ensure its sustainability and effectiveness.
Speaking on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show, Mr. Segbefia acknowledged the policy as a beneficial social intervention but stressed that it requires evaluation to address its associated challenges.
Mr. Segbefia critiqued the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) proposed Free SHS Bill, arguing that it seeks to entrench the policy rather than address its issues.
“The Free SHS policy should be reviewable. So if the NPP is bringing a Free SHS Bill that will be looking at these issues and addressing them, which a policy document can do anyway, then it makes sense. But it seems the Bill is to protect the Free SHS policy which makes no sense. And that is where the NDC [National Democratic Congress] or minority has a problem,” he stated.
He further accused the NPP of engaging in political mischief by misleading the public into believing that opponents of the Bill want to abolish the Free SHS policy.
“Nobody has ever said that the Free SHS is a bad thing. As for the review, it is necessary and even the IMF has made it part of the programme that the government should look at the Free SHS policy. Nobody has said scrap, review is review,” he emphasized.
Mr. Segbefia also pointed out that the initial call for a review of the Free SHS policy came from within the NPP itself, specifically from former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta.
He cited Mr. Ofori-Atta’s suggestion that the policy should be targeted at those with genuine needs rather than benefiting everyone indiscriminately.
“He looked at the books and made it abundantly clear that it is not in the country’s interest that there is no payment scheme that can help the course,” Segbefia noted.
The Free SHS programme was a major campaign promise by then-Presidential candidate Nana Akufo-Addo in 2016 and has since become an integral part of Ghana’s educational system following its launch in 2017.