Will the delayed feeding grants in our boarding institutions ever go away?

The Colleges of Education were in the news a few days ago over their decision to allow the teacher trainees to feed themselves starting May 1, 2022, if the government fails to provide the feeding grants to them. It did not take long for the Minister of Education to respond.

He indicated that the government has released over 67

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Citi News is reporting that some of the colleges have started receiving their money and that the rest will receive their grants by Monday. They quoted the President of the Principals of the Colleges, Dr. Nyamekye, as having said, "Some colleges of education were asked to pick up their cheques on Thursday. I am sure those who live closer to Accra have received their money by now. Hopefully, by Monday, all the schools will have had their share."

The question many Ghanaians are asking is where was this money? And why did the government wait for the colleges to reach breaking points before releasing the money to them?

This is not the first time colleges have gone through this torture. As far back as November 2016, Citi TV reported that the teacher trainee association gave the government a two-day ultimatum to release their feeding grants. They quoted the President of the Association at the time, Jonathan Apam, as having said, "The government has gone round announcing every day that it feeds us daily, three times and that our feeding grants will always be given to our principals to feed us, but what happens is that we have to pay GH560 every semester such that the government refunds." "For the past semester and this semester, which is almost coming to an end, the government has refused to refund the money we have already paid."

In 2021, Joy News reported that the principals of colleges of education across Ghana have threatened to shut down the schools by the end of May if the government does not release funds for the maintenance of students’ stay on campus. They also quoted the president of the association, Emmanuel Nyamekye, as having said, "If nothing is done in the next couple of weeks, we may be compelled to ask our students to go home."

The issue is not different when it comes to senior high schools. We can even say their case is worst as the issue of feeding grants is now a termly issue. From the days of free education in the Northern sector to the current free education across the country, the issue of feeding grants will not just go away.

One cannot also forget about the school feeding programs at the basic level. S. Kedze (2013) looked at the "Distortive Effects of Ghana’s Schools’s Feeding Programme on Primary Education Delivery and the results show how the multi-functional approach can produce distorted effects on some of the schools that have benefited from the well known Home Grown School Feeding Programme (HGSFP).

Akuamoah-B, C. and Sam-Tagoe, J. (2018) found that since the initial agreement with donor support from the Dutch government elapsed in 2010, the issue of the school feeding programme suffers since the burden of Funding for the GSFP now rests heavily on the government of Ghana. They indicated that the government finds it difficult to secure money for the timely and regular release of funds to the Municipal Assembly and to the beneficiary schools. They added that when this happens the Municipal Assembly is unable to pay caterers who provide food for the beneficiaries.

We want to use this medium to appeal to this government and all future governments to prioritize the feeding grants issue to help in producing the right human resources we all desired.