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Wassa East Member of Parliament (MP), Isaac Agyei Mensah has expressed doubts about the efficacy of the directive by the Ghana Education Service (GES) to Heads of public Senior High Schools (SHS) to reduce tuition fees.

The GES has issued a directive for all Heads of SHS to cut down fees to be paid by final year students in the third term by 50%.

A memo dated Friday, March 30, 2018 issued by the Director-General of the GES, Prof. Kwasi Opoku-Amankwa, to all Regional Directors of Education noted that the fee reduction is become necessary because the students, who would start their 2018 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) in April and end on June 1, 2018, would spend only seven weeks instead of the full 14 weeks in school.

“Management has noted that senior high schools will reopen for the third term of the current academic year on 16th April, 2018 and will end on 2nd July, 2018, which interprets into 14 weeks.

“It has also been noted that final-year students will write the final paper for the WASSCE on the 1st of June, 2018. This means final-year students will be in school for the third term from 16th April to 1st June, 2018, which also interprets into seven weeks. The implication is that final-year students will be in school for exactly half of the normal term. It is, therefore, directed that final-year students should pay one half or 50 per cent of the fees for the third term", the memo read.

Addressing the issue on Peace FM's 'Kokrokoo' programme, Hon. Agyei Mensah told host Kwami Sefa Kayi that the directive may fail explaining that the parents of the students have already paid the fees and so returning part to them will be met by some sort of red tape.

He further said the GES has problems with documentation and therefore accounting for the records of the payment of the fees in order for the payees to reimburse to the payers won't be an easy task.

He however complimented the GES for issuing such directive but advised the management to put the right measures in place so that payers of fees wouldn't have to go through frustrations and struggles to recoup their money.

He also believed that some will not even get their monies back, opining that "getting their monies back to them will be a major [major] major challenge . . . Let’s be honest with ourselves. We know how the mechanism is like, even paying people. GES is big, paying people; it goes to the bank and it comes to you. Reconciling the account and so forth, it’s not easy. ”