Demonstrate against free SHS - NDC aspiring flagbearer to parents

Former Minister of Trades and Industry Dr. Ekow Spio Garbrah has urged parents to stage a protest against the

According to him, the constitution makes education progressively free for all.

He said while the NDC was talking about progressive free education, the NPP shifted the goal post since it was not their main campaign policy but constitutional.

Constitutional provisions

Chapter 5 of the 1992 Constitution on Fundamental Human Rights and Freedoms, Clause 25 (1) states that all persons shall have the right to equal educational opportunities and facilities and with a view to achieving the full realisation of that right.

Clause 1 (a) states that basic education shall be free, compulsory and available to all, while clause (b) also states that secondary education in its different forms, including technical and vocational education, shall be made generally available and accessible to all by every appropriate means, and in particular, by the progressive introduction of free education.

Spio-Garbrah chides Nana Addo

Speaking on Metro TV’s Good Evening Ghana show, he said issues related to education were in the Constitution but was worried the compulsory nature was muted.

"I was Minister of Education and we were promoting FCUBE [Free Compulsory Basic Education] in NDC time and this is not what we promised.

"If the constitution says make education progressively free then the lower level of education must also be free. You would not know the point the child may fall from the educational ladder…so if the education is as free as possible at the lowest level and as the child goes up and by any accident they drop up it should be at the basic level," he said.

Spio-Garbrah who has made his intentions to contest as flagbearer of the NDC in elections 2020 said "if you go to the middle level of the educational system and say we will make this part free…three years of SHS and lower level is actually paying it is a travesty, it against the constitutional provisions and Ghanaians should wake up to it."