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The 2016 Vice Presidential Candidate of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has assured Ghanaians that a future NPP government will eliminate all taxes levied on private universities. According to him, tertiary education has become expensive and inaccessible due to the current taxes imposed on private universities in the country.

Dr. Bawumia, who was speaking at an SRC forum at the Methodist University in Accra, maintained that private universities are suffocating under high taxes imposed on them by government. He argued that the decision to waive the taxes, will cause school fees to go down substantially, thereby triggering an increase in tertiary education enrollment across the country. He stressed that “it is not a coincidence that some 80% of universities in Ghana are private universities” admitting the growing population of students who wish to further their education. “We should rather be encouraging the setting up of more private universities with tax incentives to relieve the burden on government”, he said.

Dr. Bawumia, who also lashed out at government explained that, tax incentives should rather be used to improve enrollment into tertiary institutions. Urging the students to vote for the NPP, Dr. Bawumia bemoaned government’s decision to impose high taxes that only burdens the citizenry. “When you impose taxes on universities, guess who pays the tax, these students and their parents,” he said adding that “it doesn’t make sense”.