President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was on Thursday, December 9, 2021, given a lifetime achievement award for his administration’s flagship Free Senior High School policy.
The award was by the US National Bar Association, whose President was at the Jubilee House to present the award to Akufo-Addo.
The award came with a plaque presented by the Association’s president Judge Carlos E. Moore, along with a delegation.
Commenting on the award, Akufo-Addo posted on his social media handles: “The President of the US National Bar Association, Judge Carlos E. Moore, also presented a “Lifetime Achievement Award” in recognition of my “initiative to provide free quality education to students”, which “will help with the broader development” of Ghana and achieving Goal 4 of Sustainable Development Goals.”
It is not the first time the policy has won Akufo-Addo an award, in 2018, Akufo-Addo was awarded by the Africa Leadership University with the Nelson Mandela Africa Leadership University award, for the implementation of the ‘Free Senior High School’ policy.
At the time, the founder of the University, Fred Swanika, identified four reasons for which the academic institution decided to award the President.
The key reason, however, was summed up in a speech at the award dinner to present the citation where Swaniker stated that, “Education is the most powerful weapon that can be used to change the world.”
President Akufo-Addo he said, is an embodiment of the statement above by virtue of his policy of free SHS which is currently underway in Ghana.
The second reason for the award, he said, is because the President believed in the youth of Ghana and those of the African continent as a whole.
The third rationale behind the award is the persistence of the President in that he did not give up after running for office twice and losing on both attempts. Rather he still took the step and gave it a third try that eventually succeeded. The last reason behind the award, according to Swanika, is the President’s belief in African self-reliance, a starrfm.com.gh report stated at the time.
The Free SHS policy
A policy of the government of Ghana, starting in September 2017. Every child in Ghana who qualifies for, and is placed in a public Senior High School for his secondary education will have his/her fees absorbed by the government.
Nine months after taking over the reins of government in 2017, the New Patriotic Party launched the programme which was a key promise in its 2016 election manifesto.
By Free SHS, the government meant free tuition, admission fee, textbooks, library fees, science centre fees, fees for ICT, examination fees, payment of utility fees, boarding and meals.
Implementation of the Free SHS Programme commenced in September 2017 with every Ghanaian child who was placed into a public second cycle institution by the Computerized School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS) during the 2017 school placement eligible to enjoy Free SHS.
Government absorbed all fees approved by the GES for 353,053 first-year students made up of 113,622 Day students and 239,431 Boarding students.
The first cohort of students under the programme has since graduated, while, currently, total Free SHS enrolment stands at 1,199,750 students, with the government spending 2.2billion cedis since the launch of the programme.
However, a former Deputy Education Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has pointed out inconsistencies in the government’s data on the flagship Free Senior High School programme, which GhanaFact has verified to be true.
