The Minister of Education has been fined an amount of GHS50,000 by the Right to Information (RTI) Commission over the reluctance of the Minister to release details of the 2021/2022 Computerized School Placement.
The African Education Watch had exhausted all administrative procedures required for accessing the information, but the Minister refused to honour the request and also failed to respond to the RTI Commission’s letter on the matter.
Nearly everything about the 2021/2022 School placement has been clouded in secrecy, and the public is wondering what the Minister and the Ministry of Education are hiding from the General public. One key maxim of equity is “He who comes to equity must come with clean hands”
The investigative piece by the Fourth Estate which was released on the same 2021/2022 school placement revealed that employees of the Ministry and some syndicates were selling school placements into Free SHS. The rot was further traced to the office of the Minister of Education, who is yet to openly react to the news making rounds.
The big question is what is the Minister and the Ministry of Education hiding from the public, for which reason it refused to make the data requested by African Education Watch available?
For failing to respond to the Applicant and the RTI Commission, the RTI took a final decision on the matter and for this reason, an administrative penalty of Ghs50,000 was imposed on the respondent and this shall be payable to the commission not later than 14 days after the receipt of this decision of the commission. The penalties imposed shall attract an additional potential default penalty rate of 10% on the principle that the sum of Ghs50,000 and in the event of default for any additional 14 days thereafter. This is according to the letter from the RTI Commission sighted by ExamHall. Org.
The RTI also directed that the following pieces of information pertaining to the school placement for the 2021/ 2022 academic year be released to the applicant
a. The index numbers of all candidates placed
b. Schools of all candidates list
c. JHS attended by all candidates placed
d. The Raw score of all candidates placed
There is no doubt that the release of the data or piece of information requested by the Africa Education Watch will get heads rolling after the applicant has done a thorough data analysis.
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The information requested, if finally released, will also the public to know for instance
- Candidates who never deserved category A or B schools based on their grades were placed there.
- It will help make public the rot that went on and those who paid their way through to get their wards placed in schools that their children ordinarily, by the rules of the school placement, do not deserve.
- It will also help reveal if students from private JHS were fairly treated during the 2021/2022 school placement.
The Examhall.org believes there are interesting days ahead and look forward to sharing the findings of the African Education Watch from the data they would receive from the Minister of Education and the Ministry as directed by the RTI Commission.