The Minority Spokesperson on Education, Peter Nortsu-Kotoe, says the government of Ghana’s indebtedness to the West African Examination Council (WAEC) is having a heavy toll on the operations of the organization.
After releasing both the BECE and WASSCE results, WAEC has still not paid invigilators, examiners and a host of other service providers, according to Nortsu-Kotoe.
Speaking on the floor of Parliament, he stated that prior meetings held with the Finance Ministry, the Education Ministry and WAEC revealed that the Finance Ministry had released funds to the Education Ministry to settle the debt.
He is therefore calling on the Education Ministry to clear the debt as soon as practicable following the approval of GH₵29.5 billion for the Ministry to spend in 2024.
“But interestingly, the Ministry of Finance indicated that they do not owe WAEC. That the sum of GH₵129,839,720 WAEC said they owe, the ministry of Finance said they did not owe that and that per their records they have released all monies to the Ministry of Education.
“So the committee has directed that the Minister for Finance or his representative, the Minister for Education and WAEC should meet the committee to resolve the matter. The one who represented the Ministry of Finance at the meeting indicated that for the WASCCE, they made it part of the amount released for the free SHS so on record they do not owe WAEC any sums of money.
“So we need to meet the Minister of Education, the Minister for Finance and WAEC to resolve the problem immediately,” he said.
Peter Nortsu-Kotoe also revealed Education Minister Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum has confirmed to the Education Committee of Parliament that a piece of land reserved to build an office for UNESCO in Accra has been sold to a private developer.
“We also realised that UNESCO, that is, United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation is one agency under the Ministry of Education and they’re housed in an obscure corner in the Ministry of Education.
“But unfortunately, the piece of land allocated for their office long time ago, Mr. Speaker, I made it known here the other time when we were debating the budget that the land had been sold. The Deputy Minister for Land and Natural Resources vehemently denied it.
“But at the meeting to discuss the budget we were told by the Minister of Education or he confirmed that the land had been sold and to a private individual, and he’s taking steps to retrieve the land for the Ministry of Education so that UNESCO can make use of that land,” he said.
Source: myjoyonline