Ashanti Region named as region with most completed SHS projects

The Education Minister, Matthew Opoku Prempeh, has revealed that the Ashanti Region has the most completed Senior High School (SHS) projects in the country. The region has 56 completed projects out of a total of 236 projects, followed by the Northern Region with 26 projects.

Responding to questions in Parliament on Tuesday, Mr. Opoku Prempeh said a total of 822 projects were under construction in Senior High Schools across the country. “The Ministry, till date, has awarded a total of 822 contracts for various

infrastructure projects at the Senior High School level across the country.” He added that the projects include “six-unit, eight-unit, 12-unit and 18-unit classroom blocks, single dormitory blocks, single one storey or two storey dormitory blocks, and toilet blocks,” among others.

962 SHS infrastructural projects ongoing nationwide

With over 1.2 million children currently enrolled in Senior High Schools across the country, the President, Nana Akufo-Addo has explained that the expansion in access, has automatically, brought with it a problem of infrastructure which has necessitated the implementation of various infrastructural projects to meet the demands.

In March this year, he revealed that a total of 962 structures were being constructed in all Senior High Schools across the country to address infrastructural challenges.

According to him, the government has put in place an elaborate program to ensure that the many problems faced by second cycle schools as a result of the introduction of the Free SHS are addressed.

Government owing contractors

In June 2019, there were claims that there is a shortage of boarding facilities because the government has failed to pay contractors who were awarded contracts to put up structures in various Senior High Schools across the country.

There were threats by the contractors to stop work if they were not paid the money owed them. Reacting to this, the Education Minister chided the Association of Building and Civil Engineering Contractors of Ghana for threatening to close down all Senior High School projects across the country.

According to him, the Association’s claims were not justified. “We don’t owe any contractor doing a project in any Senior High School in the country whether new or old. I have told them that all those who have not completed their projects will not be

awarded any other contracts in this regime. A lot of contractors are not owed but they have abandoned their sites because they want to come back for variations,” he said.