NUGS lauds commitment to restore students’ allowances
The National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) has lauded the commitment made by the current government to restore allowances to students in Colleges of Education (CoE) and Nursing Training Colleges (NTC).
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The leadership of the student body said the assurance given by the Vice-President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, last week that the payment of the allowances would begin in March this year, was a step in the right direction.
At a news conference in Accra yesterday, the President of NUGS, Mr Luqman Abubakari, also called on the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Finance, and the Controller and Accountant General’s Department (CAGD) to take immediate steps to pay newly trained teachers from CoE who had still not been paid for five months after completion of their courses.
“As we speak, quite a number of graduates from the nursing training institutions who have successfully completed their courses are in the house, while their colleagues from CoEs who were posted in September last year are yet to be paid their salaries.
“We know that there is a new era, so we call on the current administration to take steps to address these issues,” he said.
Narrative
One of the issues that were central to the campaign promises of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in the run up to the 2016 elections was to restore the allowances of students of CoEs and NTC that had been cancelled by the then government.
The cancellation of the allowances that was introduced in the 1980s, as a measure to motivate students to take up the teaching profession, was against the backdrop of the conversion of CoEs into tertiary institutions.
The move was also meant to remove the quota system that gave limited slots to the CoEs in terms of intake of students.
After the allowances were cancelled and replaced by the students loans scheme, the quota system was removed, leading to an increase of the enrolment in CoEs to about 500 per cent.
With the restoration of the allowances set to begin in March this year, it means that more resources will have to be committed to pay the huge number of students who are currently in the 38 public CoEs.
Worthy investment
But Mr Abubakari observed that no investment could be worth it than committing resources to build the human resource base of the country.
He said investment in education was critical and could not be mortgaged for anything else.
The NUGS President also observed that it was important for the current administration to take steps to make the Ministry of Youth and Sports relevant to the development of the youth.
“It is an undeniable fact that over the years, the concentration of past ministers has always been on sports, leaving out the youth component.
“We, therefore, call on the new minister-designate for that sector, Mr Isaac Asiamah, to work hard to rejuvenate the National Youth Authority (NYA) Board to tackle issues concerning youth development,” he added.