The John Dramani Mahama administration would employ innovative financing to sponsor education in Ghana, a Deputy Minister for Finance and Economic Planning, under the erstwhile John Dramani Mahama administration, Mona Quartey has indicated.
According to her, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) would not be overly reliant on oil revenue to finance education, particularly the Free Senior High School policy.
Mona Quartey avers the education globally given the interest in IT development could be self-financing. She noted in an earlier interview on Jolly Breakfast Show of Skyy Power Fm that the John Mahama administration when given the nod would explore innovative financing to support the education of today’s generation and those that are yet to come.
“Well the financing of free SHS will continue as it is going on now… which is out of public investment, and we will make sure that we are able to generate revenue even in the educational sector to cover some of those costs.
“So as we increase expenditure on education we will ensure that there is some revenue tapped in that same area of education because education results in the generation of revenue. There are many aspects of education that can generate revenue, especially in the ICT era,” she explained.
Ms. Quartey argued that the NPP government had breached the Petroleum Management Act by exploiting the proceeds from the nation’s oil production to finance the Free SHS.
“We saw free SHS come wholesale and it was financed out of oil revenue and there was a breach in the use of those revenues from that project in when that old manifesto was presented in 2016 it didn’t speak to using oil revenue for free SHS but we found that that was what happened and that was a breach of the Petroleum Revenue Management act.”
She Quartey however added that the NDC has no other choice but to explore that whiles restructuring the educational system.
“However, it has come and most likely it has come to stay. Once that incentive has come into society you cannot redraw it. We had spoken about doing it progressively so that it does not burden the taxpayer. Now that it is already in place we intend to shut down the double-track system,” she added.