Why the National Compass Must Guide the Mission Ship

About weeks or months ago, the controversy was about a 'hair brouhaha.' Now, the battle has deepened, moving from the visible sign of the head to the invisible sanctuary of the soul. The case now before the Supreme Court over Wesley Girls’ Senior High School (SHS) is, without a shred of equivocation, a straight litmus test for the kind of country we are today. The suit filed by Shafic Osman, challenging the school’s alleged restrictions on Muslim students, reveals a fissure in our collective understanding of what it means to be a truly public institution in a religiously pluralistic land. This moment, born from the initial controversy surrounding the denial of a student’s right to observe the Ramadan fast, forces us to address the ghosts of history that still cast long shadows over the national harvest.

The core contention asks: Can a school, once a magnificent oak planted by a missionary hand, continue to dictate sectarian weather once its roots are fully watered by the national treasury?

The Legal Identity of the State-Funded School

The entire argument boils down to a question of legal identity. For the founding religious bodies, "the Christian Council of Ghana and the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference", the state’s support is seen as "a partnership, not a takeover." They insist upon their right to manage schools according to their century-old and faith-based ethos, arguing that parents who enroll their children tacitly agree to abide by the Christian mandate. This is the argument of the ancient vineyard owner, asserting absolute domain over his soil.

Yet, when the sun of the state shines upon the school’s fields, and when the teachers’ salaries are drawn from the Consolidated Fund (as mandated by the Ghana Education Service Act, 1995), the land acquires a new, shared title. Legal scholar Professor Stephen Kwaku Asare (Kwaku Azar) cuts through this duality with the sharp machete of law: "Wesley Girls is no longer a Methodist private school. It is a public school, fully under the Government of Ghana," he declares, insisting that the Constitution must seize the front seat from denominational tradition. The legal instruments confirm this status. A public school is defined by the Pre-Tertiary Education Act, 2020 (Act 1049), as one established or maintained wholly or in part with monies approved by Parliament from the Consolidated Fund or other public funds. When an institution relies entirely on public funds ( the taxpayer money contributed by citizens of all faiths) it is inherently bound by the public duties of non-discrimination and neutrality.

The Plaintiff’s Stance

Most crucially, the plaintiff, Lawyer Shafic Osman, in an interview with JURIST News on January 27, 2025, contends that such compulsion constitutes an "establishment of religion" in violation of Article 56 of the 1992 Constitution. The framers of our democracy, wise to the perils of ideological homogeneity, denied Parliament the power to enact any law that authorizes the imposition of a compulsory religious program on the people of Ghana. The Constitution is a compass set north toward pluralism, and no public institution may deliberately point it toward a single denominational destination.

The case filed by Lawyer Osman seeks to establish a national framework. He made his broader goal clear, stating:

"Our case specifically challenges Wesley Girls' 'No Islam' policy. We're asking the court to direct the Ghana Education Service (GES) to develop guidelines on religious accommodation in public institutions of learning... The rights to religious freedom under Article 21(1)(c) and 56 of the 1992 Constitution should mean that public institutions make reasonable accommodations for students' religious practices."

His motivation is deeply rooted in the constitutional obligation to protect all faiths, as he further noted in the same interview:

"This case is ultimately about ensuring that all students in Ghana, regardless of faith, have the right to practice their religion without undue restrictions."

Equality and the Common Well
The defenders of the old ways argue in parables of their own. Former General Secretary of the Christian Council, Rev. Opuni Frimpong, states with stern conviction: “You cannot leave available Muslim schools and come to our Christian schools to dictate terms.” But this statement misunderstands the nature of public resource distribution. When a citizen pays taxes into the common well, that citizen has an equal and inalienable right to drink from the schools built by that common water.

This constitutional reality is underscored by the nation's religious composition, confirmed by the Ghana Statistical Service’s 2021 Population and Housing Census (PHC): Christianity is practiced by 71.3% of the population, Islam is practiced by 19.9%, and the remaining 8.8% includes followers of Traditionalist faiths (3.2%) and those with No Religion/Other (5.6%). It is the combined, diverse contributions of this entire Ledger of All Faiths that maintain every public school

As the legal maxim suggests, the right to religious manifestation may be limited only if prescribed by law and necessary in a democratic society for ends such as public safety or health—restrictions that must be proportionate and must not nullify the right itself.

My own educational days at Pope John Senior High School and Minor Seminary (POJOSS), a Catholic institution, offer a crucial perspective on harmonious coexistence. As a student there, I observed that the school, while maintaining its Catholic ethos like enforcing its institutional policy of reserving the position of Head Prefect (Head Boy) exclusively for Catholic students, it also demonstrated great maturity in religious accommodation. Muslim students faced no restrictions on fasting or prayer; they were allowed to observe Ramadan and daily prayers without issue. This proves that a religious-founded school can fully respect the right to religious practice.

The Decolonial Imperative for the 21st Century Learner

This debate is deeply intertwined with Ghana’s identity crisis in the post-colonial epoch. The mission schools, lauded for pioneering education, simultaneously functioned under a colonial tradition that allowed religious programs to operate on public funds. Now, the national educational policy itself requires a conceptual decolonization, which is a purging of the uncritical assimilation of restrictive practices (Donkor, 2025; Atiemo, 2010).

The modern curriculum demands that the schools produce citizens capable of Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Competency, respecting evidence, reasoning, and different perspectives (Ministry of Education, n.d.). Our schools are explicitly tasked with raising morally conscious and tolerant learners who promote peaceful coexistence and national development. This requires a pedagogy that actively discourages rote memorization of singular doctrines in favor of analyzing diverse religious beliefs and practices objectively (Ministry of Education, n.d.; Assanful, 2022). If the state-funded school, whose very mandate is to foster this spirit of Glocal Citizenship and mutual respect (Ministry of Education, n.d.), becomes a tool for the suppression of minority faiths, then the institution risks becoming an ideological battleground, threatening the very peaceful co-existence that Ghana currently enjoys.

The Master Key of the Constitution

The Ghanaian Constitution is not a piece of antique furniture to be admired from a distance. This great 'Book of the Republic' is the master key to the national home. It dictates that every child, regardless of the faith of the school’s founder, must find in that public institution a sanctuary for the soul and an equal opportunity for the mind. The Supreme Court is now tasked with turning the lock, making clear that religious freedom is not a privilege granted by the school, but an inviolable right guaranteed by the State.

The core issue in the Wesley Girls’ litigation is, therefore, whether the school's policies shift from constitutionally permissible cooperation and accommodation to constitutionally forbidden establishment and coercion.

This litigation, in comparative perspective, is effectively a constitutional stress test. Like a building erected during one architectural era but later adapted for modern seismic standards, Ghana’s mission schools must now ensure their century-old structures are constitutionally sound. The bedrock of religious freedom and non-discrimination, mandated by the 1992 Constitution, must be strong enough to support the diverse population that public funding now requires them to serve.

The writer, Dickens Asare Ofori Adjei, is a freelance journalist, author, and advocate who champions Media and Information Literacy, and vehemently opposes violence against women and children.

Email: dickensadjei20@gmail.com

   Comments0