The leadership of the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) has expressed its displeasure about how issues of student agitations are handled especially in some parts of the northern regions of Ghana. This was contained in a press release NUGS copied to myJCR News.
Please find below, the full content of the December 3, 2014 press release by NUGS.
NUGS UNHAPPY WITH THE HANDLING OF STUDENT AGITATIONS
The National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS), would like to register its displeasure about how issues of student agitations are handled in recent times especially in some parts of Northern Ghana.
It is very important for us as a country to constantly look at how we handle such dicey issues that keep on recurring every now and then so that we could find an appropriate remedy to forestall future occurrences.
We remember vividly how students of Ghana Secondary School in Tamale had an encounter with school authorities and the police in 2011. At the end of the day, some students were sacked whereas every other student was surcharged for the damages purportedly caused by them.
Again, a similar incident recently happened at the Wa Islamic Senior High School where some ‘agitating students’ of the school were severely brutalized by some military personnel in the region who were allegedly hired by the school authorities to visit such cruelty and inexplicable mayhem on them for vehemently protesting against certain ‘infamous decisions’ on the part of their school authorities.
As if that is not enough, most recently a final year student by name Bawa Emmanuel of the Bolgatanga Senior High School fell and lost his precious life after allegedly being chased together with his colleagues by the senior house master of the school over their refusal to attend early morning assembly on time.
His avoidable demise is devastatingly unfortunate and NUGS wishes to commiserate with the bereaved family, friends and indeed all sympathizers for such shocking development.
We are keenly following this matter which is currently being investigated by the CID of the Ghana Police Service and shall advise ourselves accordingly relative to ensuring that substantial justice is served to all concerned.
The shocking death of Master Bawa Emmanuel resulted in some vehement protestation and disturbances on the part of the students culminating in the abrupt indefinite closure of the school. Per our investigation, there appears to be a frantic effort by the school authorities to put the entire blame at the doorstep of the students while exonerating the teacher from any culpability.
Well, we want to trust that the CID would do proper investigations to unearth all the facts that will serve the purpose of justice because an injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Many of such incidences including issues of religious indoctrination and sectionalism occur in most of the nation’s second cycle institutions; some of which have been swept under the carpet while others were treated very lightly.
Our position is that NUGS has always been a friend of constructive engagements and as such holds a strong abhorrence to acts of insubordination and violence as a means of seeking justice or redress for any act of maladministration. It is in this light that NUGS wishes to in unequivocal terms, condemn the violent conduct of the students in the aforesaid examples and call on the relevant law enforcement authorities to subject any student found culpable to the full rigours of the law.
It is however very instructive to note that, in all of these, what is palpably missing is the voice of the students who ultimately bear the brunt of such mishaps. As a body mandated to “fight” for the interest of Ghanaian students, we would like to say that these recent worrying happenings in some of our Senior High Schools in the country with specific emphasis on some schools in the three regions of the north is a vindication of our position and also brings to the fore, our long held stance that we must have Regional Students’ Representative Councils (RSRC) in such regions in order to help readily address issues of this nature as and when they occur and provide students with the much needed voice as the law of natural justice demands.
It is therefore against this backdrop that NUGS wishes to make a passionate appeal to all stakeholders especially the Ministry of Education, Ghana Education Service, Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) to support our innocuous efforts in establishing such Regional Students’ Representative Councils in Regions that have none while strengthening existing ones to make them more fortified in championing the interest of their constituents pursuance to our constitutional regime.
In conclusion, we wish to implore the students of Ghana to keep maximum restraints in the face of provocations or perceived acts of injustices and follow laid down procedures for seeking redress. NUGS shall always be there to ensure maximum protection of their welfare so that they would enjoy the full benefits of their fundamental educational rights and freedoms as enshrined in our constitution.
Thank you.
Aluta Continua! Victoria Ascerta!!
Signed:
Rhodalyn Eshun
Press and Information Secretary
0246701359
Prosper Dzitse
President
0546580044
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