Bolgatanga, Oct. 03, GNA - Bolgatanga, the Upper East Regional capital is the venue for this year's National Best Teacher Awards ceremony scheduled for Thursday, October 5. Forty-one teachers selected from the 10 regions would receive honours in recognition of their outstanding performance in their profession.

Five of the award winners are from Upper East Region, two of them being women.

Mr Boniface Gambila, Upper East Regional Minister, announced this at a press briefing in Bolgatanga on Tuesday.

He said the region had a long-standing record of hosting national events, citing last year's National Farmers Day, Regional Ministers Conferences, visits by President John Agyekum Kufuor and Vice President Aliu Mahama, as well as a visit to the region in 2003 by Busumuru Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations. "We are therefore ready and confident in our capability to host a successful National Best Teacher Award ceremony," he declared.

Mr Gambila said with the support of stakeholders, Government was determined to provide quality education for Ghanaian children. He acknowledged the role played by the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) in the institutionalization of the Best Teachers Award in 1995, when the first award winner took 100,000 cedis as the prize.

"We have come a long way since then, as Government intervened along the line with more substantial prizes including saloon cars and a three-bedroom house," he said.

On the objectives of the awards scheme, the Upper East Regional Minister pointed out that it was to motivate teachers to improve on the quality of teaching and learning in schools and in addition, create healthy competition among teachers.

He urged all and sundry who had not been to the region before, to take advantage of the impending ceremony to come and experience the hospitality of the people and the excitement the numerous tourist sites had to offer.

Captain Simon Ansu, Acting National Co-ordinator of the Best Teacher Awards Scheme, announced that in addition to the seven categories awarded last year, new areas including those from Technical Institutions, Specialised Schools such as the disabled and institutions for the teaching of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and retired teachers had all been cited for award this year.

"For the first time in the history of the awards scheme 20 retired teachers, all selected from the host region, would be on the list from this year," he added.

On the likelihood of a disruption of the awards ceremony by some disgruntled teachers who are currently pursuing a strike action over improved conditions of service, Madam Elizabeth Ayire Mwinkaar, Upper East Regional Director of Education, gave the assurance that there would be no such disruption in spite of the ongoing strike action. She explained that GNAT members were aware that the issue at stake was receiving Government's attention, "And as teachers who should be setting good example for their pupils to emulate I do not think they would resort to such unprincipled behaviour."