Education Minister Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh, says the collapses and
fainting spells of some of the parents and students at the Black Star
Square were staged.
According to the Minister, some persons who wanted to mar the efforts
of the Ministry to address the issues of placement of students into
Senior High Schools bribed some people to feign exhaustion and collapse.
“We opened the center at the independence square to address the needs
of Ghanaians who want to go to school, but some evil people have decided
to pay GHc 20 and GHc 50 to people to go there and stage fainting and
collapse, yesterday some of the collapses were fake. I’m even wondering
why they brought little kids to the centre.”
He added that some people were at the centre even though they did not
have issues or hadn’t even followed the procedure for placement.
“Some parents and students come to complain to us that they have not
been placed but when you ask for their placement forms, they have none.
They only show you their results slip and so I had to issue a directive
that no one should come to the centre without a placement form.”
“The system works such that after you check your results, you can also
check your placement. If you have not been placed automatically, the
site will redirect you to the self-placement site where the schools that
fall in your grade line are displayed for you to choose, you will also
be given the choice of boarding or day, then you get to choose a program
from the available programmes. After which you confirm and print a
form, so there is no way you can have a placement form without having
been placed in a school. Hence, you bring your placement form for us to
resolve your issues.”
The Minister made these comments on Asempa FM’s current affairs show Ekosii sen.
There were chaotic scenes at the Black Star Square in Accra last Monday
when hundreds of desperate parents, guardians and students besieged the
Accra Solution Centre set up by the GES to handle concerns relating to
the placement of prospective students in SHSs and TVIs.
In the process, seven people, including four female students, a
pregnant woman and two male students, collapsed and were rushed to the
Greater Accra Regional Hospital, where they were treated and discharged.
