The Parents Teachers’ Association of Apremdo Catholic Basic School, in Effia-Kwesimintim Municipality of Western Region, is on a warpath with the Municipal Assembly over decision by members of the association to complete an uncompleted project in the school.
A GETFund projected started during the erstwhile John Mahama administration for the school has been stalled for the past two and half years.
Members of the Association have decided to levy themselves towards the completion of the abandoned school block. However, management of the Municipal Assembly has directed them to stop with the continuation of the project. This, according to the Municipal Assembly, is because provision of school blocks is the responsibility of the government and not the parents.
However, members of the Association insist they cannot wait forever if the government is not ready to complete the project.
Covid-19
According to the Association, the completion of the project has even become more important now in the midst of the spike in the active cases of the novel coronavirus pandemic. They have vowed to ignore the directive of the assembly and go ahead to complete the project so that it can help the school to decongest and create more classroom spaces for the children.
Meanwhile, the Assembly also insists it is not the mandate of the PTA to build school blocks and has ordered the PTA executives to, as a matter of urgency, refund all monies collected from its members.
The order from the Assembly has stirred controversy in and around the municipality, with some of the residents supporting the assembly while others are commending the PTA for taking the initiative.
The latter group is questioning the failure by EKMA to complete the project if they so desired.
Decision
Reports indicate that at their last PTA meeting, held three days before re-opening of schools, each parent at Apremdo Catholic School agreed to pay GHC15 to raise an estimated amount of GHC12,000 needed for the completion of the abandoned block.
The chief of the community, Nana Egya Kwamina, was said to be at the meeting and fully supported the move. According to the PTA chairman, Daniel Agbese, it was a decision willingly taken by the parents to help curb the spread of Covid-19 among the school children.
According to him, the school, with a population of 920 students, has neither toilet facility nor urinal with. He added that each of the three Junior High classrooms has over 130 students. He said this situation is against the Ghana Education Service new directive of 35 students per classroom, hence the decision by the Association to complete the abandoned block.
A source at the assembly however told the Daily Statesman that executives of the PTA failed to comply with government’s directive that any public school with more than 35 children in a classroom should notify authorities for redress.
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