The over 2.4m Free SHS beneficiaries may disappoint NDC, not generations yet unborn

Apparently, the NDC loyalists are well aware of the massive debt the ambivalent Mahama government left behind, and hence have been wondering how and why any government could afford to implement and sustain the seemingly admirable, albeit costly social intervention such as the Free SHS.

I must therefore confess that I feel extremely uncomfortable anytime I listen to the NPP government communicators engaging in heated, albeit, in my humble opinion, needless debate with the opposition NDC operatives over the poverty reduction Free SHS.

To me, the NPP faithful must not waste their precious time arguing with the vociferous NDC operatives over the Free SHS programme, for it does not matter whether the government implement a double track or shift system.

But what matters most is how we can get the majority of the qualified students on board and the benefits that can be derived from the programme thereafter.

And, what is more pleasing to some of us is that, the social mobility improvement Free SHS should at least provide a sound and congenial environment for the students to develop to their full potential and to have a reasonable chance of leading productive and creative lives.

The fact however is, by the year 2020, the NDC operatives will take back their needless criticisms when all the three levels of the SHS become free.

In the meantime, the clamorous NDC brassbound followers can go ahead and discredit the Free SHS and the double track system to the unsuspecting students and their parents.

The fact of the matter is that by the end of the 2019/2020 academic year, the students and their parents will show their gratitude to the NPP government for their great sense of foresightedness.

Interestingly, credible sources have it that the students are extremely happy with the Akkufo-Addo’s government for implementing the poverty alleviation Free SHS.

Conversely, the students who were denied free SHS under the erstwhile NDC administration had expressed their disappointments. The students beef stems from the fact that, although it was possible for the outgone NDC government to roll out the free SHS programme as done by the NPP government, Mahama’s government woefully failed to do so.

The students, however, insist that if Mahama’s government had rolled out the programme a few years earlier, most of the students would have enjoyed the Free SHS.

There you go. If the NDC operatives think they are fighting in the corner of the aggrieved students and their families, they better watch out. The fact is, the students and their parents/guardians are extremely unhappy with the erstwhile NDC government for letting them down.

In fact, I could not agree more with the aggrieved students and their parents/guardians, in the sense that if the NPP government can implement Free SHS, what then prevented the NDC government from rolling out the Free SHS in their eight years in office?

Well, my advice to the NPP faithful is: refrain from debating the inveterate propagandists, whose prime objective is to punch needless holes in the Free SHS implementation by any means possible.

Since assuming office, Akufo-Addo’s government has taken commendable strides with a view to improving social mobility. Indeed, the implementation of poverty reduction policies such as Free SHS, one district one factory, one million dollars per constituency, tax reductions, a dam per village in the northern part of Ghana, among others, will improve social mobility in the long run.

Given that education is crucial to the advancement of the nation, it is indeed necessary for discerning Ghanaians to give their full support to Akuffo-Addo’s well-thought through Free SHS policy.

Regrettably, however, it would appear that the minority NDC operatives are not supportive of the Free SHS implementation.

As a matter of fact, the minority NDC operatives have a penchant for shrilling, grouching and opposing for opposing sake.

If that was not the case, how could a supposedly responsible opposition keep on playing down the associated benefits of the newly implemented Free SHS?

It is, indeed, extremely difficult to comprehend an opposition party whose main duty is to offer a credible opposition, and yet failing to do so.

I bet, should the Free SHS beneficiaries make an unpardonable mistake and hand over the poverty alleviation free SHS programme back to NDC government futuristically, the supposedly social democrats will gleefully revert the comprehensively free policy to their much touted ‘progressively free’ (whatever that means).

In sum, my heart will continue to bleed for my beloved Ghana, so long as we have in our midst the cunning wolves, who have unfortunately disguised themselves in sheep’s clothing.