Mankessim (C/R), Oct 3, GNA - The Mankessim Programme Area Manager o= f Plan Ghana, Mr Sulemana Gbana, has appealed to teachers and parents to help children to cultivate the habit of reading. Mr Gbana said this when addressing a reading competition orgnised by Plan Ghana, a non-governmental organization, for schools in Mankessim Programme Area. He said Plan Ghana was committed to the improvement of education in it= s sponsored schools and added 93this cannot be done without getting children= to read and understand what they have read." Mankessim Programme Area covers some schools in the Mfantseman Municipality, Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese and Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam districts. Mr Gbana said a child who could not read and understand what he or she had read was at disadvantage in education and needed to be helped to overcome it. He said Plan Ghana was undergoing restructuring that would make for only one office of the NGO to be operating in each region. This, he said, would mean that Mankessim and Bawjiase Programme Areas would be combined and relocated at Winneba. He assured schools under its sponsorship that the NGO would ensure tha= t they are not affected by the restructuring. Mrs Grace Adu Appiah, the Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese District Director of Education, commended Plan Ghana for organizing the competition and appealed for its expansion.

She said schools scoring zero percent in examinations were the result of students' inability to read and understand what they had read. Dennis Boakye of Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam came first in Primary 914', Prince Awuku Asare of Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese, second and Razak Asiedu of Mfantseman third. In Primary 915', Emmanuel Ackrommond of Mfantseman came first, Isaac Tetteh of Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam and Nelson Oduro Takyi of Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese were second and third respectively. Eugene Amoah of Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam, Ebenezer Koomson of Mfantseman and Perpetual Onwonah of Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese placed first, second and third respectively in Primary 916'. In the Junior High School division, Regina Adomako of Mfantseman, Gloria Baah of Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam and Priscilla Awuku of Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese were first, second and third respectively in JHS 91= 1' while in the JHS 912' Benedicta Arthur of Mfantseman, Israel Evans Osei of Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam took first and second positions respectively.