High Cost Of TertiaryEducation

The Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, has expressed grave concern about the high cost of tertiary education, especially among the private universities in the country.

He said even though private universities are helping to bring quality tertiary education to the doorstep of many Ghanaians, the high fees being charged are making it impossible for many people to afford.

Otumfuo Osei Tutu, therefore, appealed to the government to support private tertiary institutions with infrastructure, equipment and funding to help reduce operational and overhead costs in order to
make their programmes easily affordable and accessible to many Ghanaians.

This was contained in an address read for him at the Second graduation of the Spiritan University College (SUC) at Ejisu, near Kumasi at the weekend.

Fourteen (14) students were awarded with first degrees, diplomas and certificates in philosophy, religious studies, sociology and economics.

The Asantehene pointed out that private tertiary educational institutions are playing a vital role in increasing access to higher education and there was the need for support to enable them to expand
and increase intake.

He charged managers of tertiary institutions to introduce innovative programmes that would meet the current development challenges of the nation.

Mr Joseph Kwabena Onyinah, Ashanti Regional Director of Education, praised the Catholic Church for its contribution to education in the country. He appealed to authorities of tertiary institutions not to concentrate only on the provision of knowledge and skills to students but their moral and spiritual development as well.

Reverend Father Ato Jackson-Donkor, Rector of the College, said the country would be heading for doom if tertiary institutions concentrated on introducing new programmes to the neglect of moral training of their students.

He said recent media reports of gang rape, homosexuality, sexual harassment of women and other negative practices by some university students in the country should be a wake-up call for authorities to
institute stringent measures to instils discipline in students.

President Obama's Africa speech

On July 11, 2009, was a historic day for the United States and the African continent as the first African-American President, Barack Hussein Obama, traveled to Accra, Ghana and addressed the Ghanaian Parliament.  President Obama's mere presence as the son of a Kenyan goat herder cum leader of the free world demonstrated a powerful symbolic shift in global politics. 
In his first presidential address to the African continent, President Obama pledged the United States' support for African democratic leadership and its socio-economic development.  He declared that "history was on the move" and that "Africa's future is up to Africans."  The president also extended the America's hand as a partner for Africa stating that "... in the 21st century, we are called to act by our conscience and our common interest" to do so.
President Obama's speech to Africa, although imbued with hope, still reflected the same arrogance, blame shifting, and paternalism Western leaders have shown since the continent's independent nations began to emerge.

President Obama remarks on the Cape Coast Castle EPA/SHAWN THEW

Colonial powers still claim a stronghold on Africans' future because they never left.  After the death of traditional colonialism, neo-colonialism succeeded to rule over the continent.  European monarchs and heads of state were quickly replaced by CEOs, multi-national corporations, and private investors.  Further undermining African autonomy, the International Monetar Fund (IMF) and World Bank stepped in to drown Africa's hopes of internal development under billions of dollars in high-interest loans and Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs), which cut vital social programs focusing on education and maternal and child health in favor of promoting privatization and trade with its former colonizers.
Africans cannot control their future because it was purchased by Western owned multinational corporations and global financial institutions decades ago. 
Furthermore allegations of abuses committed towards Africans by neo-colonial corporations are plenty.  On June 8, 2009 Shell gas company (Royal Dutch Shell) paid $15.5 million to the Ogoni people of Nigeria after they were found complicit in the violation of their human rights including the 1995 execution of activist and author Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others.  While in South Africa, European owned mining companies specializing in diamond and gold mining continue to compromise their employees safety and health; many not providing adequate health care or safe working environments for its staff.  And in the Congo, France's quest to acquire natural resources and minerals such as coltan, used to power cell phones, iPods, and laptops, has fueled the nation's decades long civil war.

Ghanaians line the streets to support President Obama EPA/SHAWN THEW

Just as colonizers drew the colonial map a generation ago, neo-colonialist are carving up the continent's resources in a way that deepens the ethnic conflicts and in-fighting national boundaries created 50 years prior.
President Obama said in his speech to Africa, "Freedom is your inheritance. Now, it is your responsibility to build upon freedom’s foundation."  But the West has not freed Africa.  The shackles of a century ago are still visible.  They are every dollar of international debt and every foreign-owned corporation controlling its resources.  If freedom is Africa's inheritance, then the old Western model of neo-colonialism and paternalism must die so that Africans may claim it.

NDC congress: Boakye Gyan

Major (Rtd) Boakye Djan, a member of the defunct Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), has stated that the Rawlingses will not rule out disrupting the upcoming congress of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) should they be convinced that President Mills could win the flagbearership race.

According to him, the former first family would either use physical force or a legal means to disrupt the July 8 congress.
 Mr Djan, who played a major role in the 1979 June 4 uprising, said his knowledge about Mr Rawlings convinced him that the former President Rawlings could resort to violence to get a stronger hold of the NDC than to lose it.

Again, he noted that the stakes were very high for the two contending parties - Mills and Rawlings camps - and added that the outcome of the congress had had a “wide range implications for the two leadership and their followers, that, it is going to be a ferocious fight.”

The former Rawlings ally stated that though the Rawlings camp was aware they would lose the contest, they can also not “allow themselves to be defeated, and hence would adopt some “destructive tactics”.

“And I can anticipate either a legal challenge …or a physical challenge that would disrupt it,” he maintained.

Ghana Need A Serious State Man

The campaign coordinator for the Nana Konadu for 2012 campaign team, Michael Teye-Nyaunu, has strongly condemned President Mills for declaring himself the winner of the upcoming flagbearership contest of the NDC for the election 2012.
With less than fifteen days to go for the flagbearership contest, President Mills on Wednesday June 22 told Municipal, Metropolitan and District Chiefs Executives at a conference that he has already won the contest and urged them not to worry.
Hon Teye-Nyaunu in an interview with Citi News described the president’s comment as premature and unfortunate.
According to him, none of the candidates can claim to have won even before the contest takes place in Sunyani from July 8-10.
The Lower Manya MP reiterated his earlier claim that President Mills is being misled by those around him as well as his supporters and advised him to brace himself for a drubbing in the Sunyani contest.“I wonder how he (President Mills)could say that (he had already won). You see, this is why I say that the people around him are not telling the man the truth. He is talking based on the report that they brought to him and I pity him because nobody goes into a fight thinking he is going to lose but in this case he has already lost and for him to come out with that statement, it is premature. Because the responses we are receiving do not tell us that he has won or it is a done deal.
“They (Mills campaign team) have done enough by influencing delegates with money and motorbikes and adopting tactics that are unfair but all these things notwithstanding Nana Konadu is going to win and I think that is it premature for him to declare that he has won”
Meanwhile, Nana Konadu is touring parts of the Eastern Region to campaign ahead of the July congress. Hon Teye-Nyaunu said the response from the delegates indicates President Mills will be given a serious run for his money.