250 children not in school, parents cannot afford fees

Kwamoso (E/R), June 6, GNA - Two hundred-and-fifty children who should have been in basic schools at Kwamoso and surrounding communities in the Akuapem North District are not in school because their parents cannot afford to pay their school fees and other requirements. This was disclosed by the Akrahene of Akuapem Traditional Area and chief of Kwamoso, Nana Kwame Donkor-Kissiedu the second, at a fund raising durbar in support of the completion of the Presbyterian Nursery School in the community on Sunday.

The block of three rooms with an office, a store, kitchen, bathroom and a toilet was started three years ago and has reached the lintel level.

Nana Donkor-Kissiedu appealed to the government for the re-establishment of the Kwamoso Oil Palm Plantation under the President's Special Initiative (PSI) to provide employment for the people in the town and surrounding communities. There was an oil palm plantation and a palm oil factory at Kwamoso, which was established by the State Farms Corporation in the 1960s but collapsed it in the 1980s.

Nana Donkor-Kissiedu appealed to the West African Examinations Council(WAEC) and the Akuapem North Secretariat of the Ghana Education Service(GES) to establish an examination centre at Kwamoso to help reduce the cost of candidates travelling to Mamfe for their Basic Education Certificate Examinations (BECE).

He explained that, because the town was not an examination centre, when the third year pupils of the Junior Secondary School(JSS) had to write their BECE, parents had to raise extra money for their children to travel and stay with friends and relations.

Nana Donkor-Kissiedu appealed to the Akuapem North District Assembly to help provide a community library at Kwamoso to encourage reading among the youth in the area.

The Acting Akuapem North District Chief Executive, Dr (Mrs) Eugenia Dankwa Quist, urged the people to take advantage of the opportunities available in farming to better their lot. Dr Quist advised the people to take up projects like grasscutter rearing and other projects being promoted under the PSI to help reduce poverty in the area.

She assured the people of the necessary support for the completion of the nursery block by the Akuapem North District Assembly. Mr Evans Oteng of Akuapem North Secretariat of the GES, called on parents in the area to honour their obligation to their wards and support their education.

He called on the pupils in the JSS to learn hard so that they could gain admission into the Senior Secondary School(SSS). An appeal for funds yielded seven million cedis.