Children refuse promotion because of free food

By William Yaw Owusu

Monday March 1, 2010
Some school children have refused to be promoted to senior high school because of the school feeding programme, Joseph Yieleh Chireh, Minister of Local Government and Rural Development has revealed.

He said the kids have become more interested in schools where free food is served adding “these are real facts on the ground. It just shows the need to persist to strengthen the school feeding programme.”

The Minister was speaking at a workshop organized by the ministry in collaboration with the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) to sensitise media personnel on the need to ensure accurate reportage of the school feeding concept.

He said the problems that confronted the programme when the NDC government took office are gradually being solved, saying “we have largely resolved the problems. There are a few thorny issues to thrash out.”

“There was mismanagement of the programme and that was why the Dutch government who are our sponsors threatened to withdraw from it. As a result we spent the whole of last year trying to review the whole programme to get the best for the children”.

Mr. Chireh said the Dutch support will end in 2011 but their lobbyist in the Netherlands was working hard to get the programme sustained and added “the government was committed to the programme. I am also lobbying cabinet to ensure regular flow of funds for the programme.”

He said the World Bank and other international donor agencies are interested in the programme but “they would want to see that the programme is transparent and we are accountable.”

The Minister said the government had released GH¢ 50 million for the programme while the Dutch government brought GH¢13.8 million and spent 40GHp per child per school going day, saying “more children are getting enrolment and we are making conscious effort to favour the less endowed schools.

He said it was needles for the public to politicize the programme saying “if you enter a classroom where children are being served, you will not be able to differentiate between an NDC sympathizer’s child and that of the NPP. These children just go to school to learn and enjoy themselves.”

Alhaji Suleiman Rahman, National Co-ordinator of the GSFP said the programme has been designed to grant ownership to the District Assemblies for effective implementation.

He said secretariat has created a platform for all collaborators to make contributions towards effective implementation of the programme.

Mrs. Irene Messiba also of the GSFP said the programme has been designed to use school feeding to boost domestic agriculture.

“The strategy to feed school children with locally prepared food that is nutritionally adequate will focus spending on local foodstuffs thereby providing a ready market for local farm produce, leading to wealth creation for rural households”.

Mrs. Sarah Naa Dedie Agbey, Advisor of the Dutch Development Cooperation (SNV) who briefed participants on the GSFP Social Accountability Project will help to address poor collaboration among collaborating ministries and other stakeholders and also help to make the programme very effective and sustainable.