Africawatch magazine initiates campaign to discredit free SHS

• Posted on January 24, 2018
• by Nana Kwesi Coomson
• Comment

The Africawatch pan African magazine, has initiated a campaign to discredit the free senior high school (SHS) programme, introduced by the New Patriotic Party (NPP), the Inquisitornewspaper has reported.

The magazine has consequently dedicated its February 2018 edition scheduled to be released unto newsstands next week, for the start of the said campaign.

In a 44-page Special Report on what it says is “poor education in Ghana,” the magazine, according to the Inquisitor newspaper, has already airlifted about 73,000 copies into Ghana and being kept in a house at Tema Community 18 in Greater Accra.

The magazine leads with the question, “Is FCUBE an achievement?” with the photo of the Minister of Education, Dr Mathew Opoku Prempeh on its cover page. (see photo below).

According to the newspaper, the Executive Editor of the magazine, Mr Steve Mallory has demonstrated his opposition for the Akufo-Addo led presidency for some time now.

Prior to election 2016, the magazine published in its August 2016 edition, what it said was President Akufo-Addo’s health condition and therefore concluded he was not fit to be elected as President.

According to the newspaper, even though Mr. Mallory, has never hidden the fact that President Akufo-Addo ‘was’ his friend and had contributed towards his political ambition, the relationship between the two, as well as between Mr Mallory and the NPP has become frostier after the August 2016 edition of the magazine.

The February 2018 edition of the magazine, is therefore said to be part of the existing hostilities between President Akufo-Addo and Mr. Mallory as part of efforts to strip the government bare on its flagship programme, the Free SHS which has been largely welcomed and praised by many.

This time around, the Minister of Education, Dr Mathew Opoku Prempeh has also come under attack by the magazine because of certain strong decisions he took to make the rolling out of the programme successful.

-Graphic