A deputy Minister of Finance, Abena Osei-Asare, says funding for the Free Senior High School (SHS) policy by government has been secured for the first four years.
She said although there was no sustainable source of funding for the programme, government was committed to ensuring that the policy doesn’t fail.
She disclosed that funds from the country’s oil and the GETFund would be used to run the flagship policy.
The deputy minister said this while responding to questions from participants during the launching of the 2018 citizens’ Budget, which is an abridged version of the 2018 Budget statement translated into various local dialects, at Anyinam in the Eastern Region.
“The President is dedicated and for the next four years of his tenure, funding for Free SHS is secured because by the grace of God we have oil so the President has committed portions of the oil resources to fund the Free SHS Policy, apart from this, GETFUND which has the mandate to set up support funds for education, will from 2018 also support the programme,” she said.
She added that government was still accepting proposals to collate views on sustainable ways of funding the programme.
She however, urged Ghanaians to keep the NPP in power to secure the policy since the” Free SHS is a brainchild of the party.”
“We wouldn’t want to run it for just four years, so if you want free SHS to stay then you know the party that is committed to the programme, keep the NPP in power forever to sustain the Free SHS Policy,” the minister stated.
Eastern Regional Minister, Eric Kwakye Darfuor, on his part justified that infrastructural challenges in Second Cycle Institutions though had existed for several decades; an audit had been done to address them.
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