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Augustine ‘Sextus’ Adutwum Addo, the Proprietor and sole lecturer of the St. Augustine's College of Health Care at Koforidua has been arrested and detained by the Bureau of National Investigations, a source had told The New Crusading GUIDE.

According to the source, Sextus Adutwum is being held in cells in Koforidua after some aggrieved students of the mushroom school reported him to the Police on allegations of lack of the required accreditation and tutors.

The students, according to the source, are demanding a refund of their admission fees and a closure of the school.

It would be recalled that this paper recently published a story on how the students were complaining of lack of tutors and teaching facilities among others.

Below is the previous publication by this paper on the matter which led to the arrest of the sole lecturer by the BNI.
The fate of about 150 students of the St. Augustine’s College of Health Care at Tei Nkwanta, a village near Koforidua in the Eastern Region is in limbo as investigations carried out by The New Crusading GUIDE has revealed that the school has no accreditation from any mandated Ghanaian institution.

Aside the accreditation issue, some female students of the school who spoke to this reporter on condition of anonymity recounted incidents where the proprietor, Augustine Sextus Adutwum-Addo has made sexual advances at them.

The school offers both Certificate and Diploma courses in health care and must be accredited by institutions such as the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana, National Accreditation Board and the National Vocational Training Institute(NVTI) before commencement of admissions and tuition but unfortunately, non of these institutions have accredited the school.

The unfortunate aspect of the story is that officials of the accrediting institutions say their hands are tied by the law and so they can not close down the mushroom school.

Lawrence Kwarteng-Ashia, Public Relations Director of the National Accreditation Board told this paper last Wednesday that “the law mandates us to publish names of accredited institutions but it does not give us the power to close schools without accreditation down”.

It is now clear that the fate of the students is in their hands. According to a document in possession of this paper from the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana, there are currently about 25 mushroom schools offering nursing courses without accreditation.

The school offers courses such as Anatomy, Physiology, Code of Ethics, Reproductive Health, Maths, English Language, Communication Skills among others.

The first batch was sent home some months ago and they do not know when their final exams will be written and who their examiners are.

It came to light that the Proprietor, who is a former Independent Parliamentary Candidate for New Juaben North Constituency, was doubling as the Administrator and lecturer of all the subjects. He is also said to be the host of a program on Sunrise fm, a local radio station based in Koforidua.

“I have never seen any lecturer here since I got admitted about a month ago. He is the only lecturer and he can come here at dawn for lectures. In fact he teaches all subjects which is weird”, narrated a worried student.

Sextus Adutwum-Addo was however not available for comment when this reporter visited the school last week. Several text messages to him were not replied either.

The unsuspecting students, mostly from deprived communities are made to fork out a whopping GH¢3,000 admission fee to study a One and half year Certificate course while Diploma students are made to pay Gh¢3600.

Aside the admission fee, students are made to pay Gh¢400 for ICT and Gh¢150 for Clinicals. This paper gathered that all hospitals charge Gh¢50 for clinicals but Sextus Adutwum-Addo has chosen to inflate the fee.

The school is situated in a bush and not fenced exposing the students to clear and present danger. The hostel which is walled is farther into the bush with no security guard as well. The students have to cross a bridge over the Asuoyaa river everyday which is between the college and the bush where their hostel is located.

The school has no signboard but it is very active on facebook, a social media outlet.

It would be recalled that students of the St John of God Nursing Training College at Sefwi Asafo in the Western Region recently boycotted the end-of-semester examinations and demanded that the school authorities explain the status of the school to them.

The students wanted the school authorities to tell them whether the school had accreditation to run its courses or not.

The students claimed that the authorities had swindled them because they knew the school did not have the requisite accreditation.