By Gifty Arthur

The Herald’s painstaking attempts to get some key stakeholders in the education sector to comment on the feasibility of the free Senior High School (SHS) education promise, which is shaping the campaign for the Presidential and Parliamentary elections, some 78 days away, have drawn a rather interesting revelation.

Some of the stakeholders revealed to The Herald that they fear that their comments may be tagged as belonging to one political party or the other, hence unfortunately; they have remained tightlipped in order to allow the political parties engage in a rather uninformed debate on whether or not Senior Secondary School education can be made free.

The stakeholders, which include the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT), and the Conference of Heads of Assistants Secondary Schools (CHASS), have refused to lay bare their views to shape up the debate to enable electorates make informed decision.

The call to have GNAT, NAGRAT, CHASS, the churches and other religious bodies to join the free SHS education debate was first made by the Executive Secretary of the Ghana Free Zones Board, Kojo Twum Boafo, but it fell on deaf ears thus allowing the debate to rage on without any professional contribution from the stakeholders.

Indeed, an assurance by CHASS President, Samuel Ofori-Adjei, that on Friday 14, 2012, his group would come out with a statement on the issue, is yet to come into fruition as he later told The Herald, he was out of the country.

The CHASS President, in the last week Monday edition of The Herald assured the public the CHASS was going to express its views on the feasibility of the policy, which is being championed by Nana Akufo-Addo flag bearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP).

In a telephone interview with the Vice-President of NAGRAT, Angel Kabonu, he stated that as far as his group was concerned, it had resolved not to come out on the issue as there were more pressing and critical issues which were begging for answers.

Though he admits he has a position as an educationist on the issue, he emphatically told this paper that he and his members would not say anything for now.

“There are more important things in our education sector that we have to talk about so when people call, I don’t talk about that {policy}, for now I won’t talk about it. I know a lot about it but I won’t say anything about it”, he insisted.

As the media also has a stake in the whole debate, Mr. Kabonu said he expects the media to research on the issue and bring to the public domain facts so that they ask the necessary questions.

“I expect journalists to come out with research about the pros and cons of it. And if the journalists have done that, they have would put the debate in its right perspective, but for now, some of us have just decided that, if you call any NAGRAT member, I can assure you that nobody would talk about it.

He said the group’s position not to comment on the issue is premised on current developments on the political landscape where when a professional in a sector gives his professional opinion on an issue then he is unfortunately branded as coming from a particular political party.

“If you say you like it, it means you are NPP, if you say it is not good, it means you support NDC, so we don’t want to be tagged. I know, I know, I understand what you are saying, but I just won’t tell you our position until we change our decision.

The time will come when everybody would see it, but we won’t say it now. So, as for this one we want society to take its own decision, so we don’t want to talk about it.

For now we won’t talk about it, whoever would win and they implement it, Ghanaians would see the consequence” he said. Asked if the NPP should win the elections and proceed to implement the promise and unfortunately it collapses on the head of Ghanaians what would NAGRAT say? Mr. Kabonu said “aaaah then we would all learn our lessons; we would all learn our lesson, but this one you let us all learn our lessons this time”.

Meanwhile, The Herald is informed some CHASS members believe that the Free SHS policy is not feasible at this crucial time, the members wished that government addressed challenges such as accessibility, incentives to teachers, infrastructure and many others rather than the free policy which has the likelihood to collapse the education system.

Several calls to GNAT General Secretary, Mrs. Irene Duncan Adanusa did not yield any results as her phone was off.