Deputy Minister for education, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has said vice-presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr Mahamudu Bawumia was dishonest about claims that the NPP government established the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT).
Dr Bawumia made the claim during a public lecture he delivered on the topic ‘The State of the Ghanaian Economy – A Foundation of Concrete or Straw?’ in Accra on Thursday September 8, 2016.
But in a statement put out on his Facebook page, Mr. Ablakwa said the claims Bawumia was making, giving credit to the NPP over educational reforms and achievements they hand no hand in were false and “dishonest.”
Mr Okudzeto isolated some of Bawumia’s points on education made during the presentation and Fact-checking Dr Bawumia on his education claims:
1) Bolgatanga and Wa polytechnics were established in 1999 and had enrolled students long before the NPP came to power. His claims that the NPP established both polytechnics are untrue.
In any case, Dr Bawumia should be telling Ghanaians why they failed in eight years to fulfil their promise of establishing a polytechnic in every district as contained on page 29 of the NPP’s 2000 Manifesto.
1) Instead of accounting for the lost “decentralized polytechnics” (as the NPP Manifesto refers), Dr Bawumia is rather attempting to obliterate President Rawlings’ legacy in Bolga and Wa.
2) It is intellectually dishonest to claim that the NPP established UMaT which had existed under various forms since 1952. See the official website of the university: http://umat.edu.gh/about_…/umat_main/university-history.html
3) Carrying out renovations in 36 senior high schools cannot be the same as establishing 36 senior high schools.
4) There is no teacher’s bungalow project at Dambai College of Education built at GHS 900,000 in 2011. We have checked the records and hereby challenge him to prove his allegation.
I must add that I am not surprised Dr Bawumia was this time round dead silent on initial claims he and his boss had trumpeted that current WASSCE results are the worst in history. Clearly, the self-professed lover of data does not appear to fancy that kind of data which cannot advance his political agenda, any wonder he conveniently ignored data on universal access to basic education, gender parity, time on task, social intervention programmes, scholarships, gross enrolment, textbook-to-pupil ratio, pupil-teacher ratio, TVET reforms, WASSCE awards, university rankings just to mention a few.
Hard as I have tried, it’s exceedingly worrying that I couldn’t find a single truthful claim under the education component of Dr Bawumia’s unprovoked vicious attacks on President Mahama’s government.
Let those who claim they created paradise in Ghana and yet Ghanaians voted them out in 2008 continue to live in that bubble. We have work to do and a nation to build under the inspiring, selfless, humble, visionary and unifying leadership of President Mahama.
We will stay focused on Changing Lives and Transforming Ghana.
