Help protect our land - Hohoe EP SHS appeals to government
The authorities of the Hohoe Evangelical Presbyterian Senior High School (HEPSS) have appealed to the government to provide the school with a wall to protect their land from massive encroachment.
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The originally 237 acre-school land has now reduced to 211 acres because of encroachment by some individuals.
Compensation
In an interview at Hohoe in the Volta Region, the Headmaster of the school, Mr Cephas Kujo Edusei, said the encroachment was still going on even though adequate compensation had been paid to the donor families since 1969.
He noted that the land was given to the school by the Gbi-Traditional Council which donated the land to the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana.
He expressed regret that the families of the donors were now selling the land arbitrarily, thereby creating tension between the authorities of the school and them.
Mr Edusei said the situation was affecting academic work on the compound.
“Sometimes, before we wake up, we see structures springing up which we also order our cadet corps to pull down.
“Although we have all the documents on the land, the families contend that the land is too big and so they are also entitled to some of it,” he said.
Infrastructure needed
Mr Edusei noted that the school, with a current enrolment of 2,047 students, 999 of whom are females, badly needed facilities such as an assembly hall and a girls’ dormitory for conducive teaching and learning.
He said three of the ongoing Ghana Education Tust Fund (GETFund) projects which were due to be completed by September this year were a two-storey 12-unit classroom block with a sick bay, a three-storey 18-unit classroom block and a two-storey boys dormitory.
Mr Edusei said the classrooms did not, however, come with furniture and, therefore, called on the government to look into that.
High academic performance
He said with all those challenges, the school, with a staff strength of 93, was adjudged the second best in 2015 among 84 senior high schools (SHSs) in the region at the maiden edition of a national competition organised by the Ghana Education Service (GES) held in Tamale in the Northern Region.
He stated that he was happy with the high standard of discipline in the school which was contributing to the high academic performance of students.
“Currently, the school has a two-acre cassava farm and four-acre maize demonstration farm for students pursuing Agricultural Science,” he added.