GETFund Releases Funds To Northern Schools

The Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) has released 1,855,149 Ghana cedis as scholarship grants for second cycle schools in the three northern regions. The money, which covers the 2007/2008 academic year, was released to the Scholarship Secretariat for onward transfer to the schools. "There is no outstanding debt now. With the release of the money we don't owe the schools," Assistant Director 2B of the Scholarship Secretariat, Ms Anna Adjei-Wiredu, said in an interview with the Daily Graphic on Thursday. She attributed the delay in the release of the money to administrative procedures. Heads of second-cycle schools in the three northern regions threatened to send home first and second-year students by Thursday, March 13, 2008, if full grants of the first and second terms were not released. They explained that since the beginning of the academic year in September last year, only 40 percent of the feeding grant for second and final-year students had been released, while nothing had been received for first-year students for the same term. As a result of the delay in the release of the funds, food suppliers in the three regions were on the heels of heads of senior high schools for outstanding food bills. The Minister of Education, Science and Sports, Prof. Dominic Fobih, on March 10, 2008, directed the GETFund to immediately secure funds from other sources to the Scholarship Secretariat for onward transfer to schools in the three northern regions. The GES had earlier appealed to the heads of schools to exercise restraint as steps were being taken, following the threats by heads that they were sending the students home until the funds were released. Meanwhile, the GES has welcomed the release of the funds to the schools, saying that it would ensure that academic activities were not interrupted. "This is one piece of good news and we are grateful to the GETFund," the acting head of the Public Relations Unit of the GES, Mr Paul Krampa, told the Daily Graphic.