Former Deputy Minister of Education under the erstwhile Mahama administration, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has defended the siting of community day Senior High Schools ( SHSs) built under the Mahama administration.

For him, the schools have not been operational because the Akufo-Addo administration have failed to employ personnel to manage the schools and not because of the refusal of students and parents to select the schools for placement due to poor siting as the Education Ministry argues.

“Per the Education Ministry’s rebuttal, the Akufo-Addo administration is probably the only government in the world where students are first expected to select a school for enrolment before education policymakers can then move in to recruit teachers, librarians, administrators… to set up the institutions,” Mr Ablakwa wrote in a post sighted by MyNewsGh.com

According to him, the Akufo-Addo administration instead of continually criticising the siting of these schools should redeem their campaign pledge of 300 SHSs and perhaps put them up at prime areas like East Legon.

“Now, how about the Akufo-Addo led government starting work on their own manifesto promise of 300 new Senior High Schools and perfectly siting them in East Legon, Airport Residential Area, Cantonments and other choice locations only a superior competent NPP can secure?” he asks.

The controversy on the siting of the Community Day SHSs resurfaced after the former President John Mahama visited an abandoned SHS, the Mpaha Community Day SHS in the Central Gonja District of the Savannah Region earlier this week.

The former President criticised the current government for the abandonment but government swiftly responded blaming him for siting the schools poorly thereby making them unattractive to students and teachers.