The government has fulfilled one of the promises it made to the over 200 schoolchildren exposed to bee attacks and harsh weather conditions for want of a classroom block in Bongo, a district in the Upper East region— distribution of free pairs of school uniform to the disadvantaged children.

Some 160 pupils of the Goo-Atandaa KG/Primary School received the familiar ‘gold and cocoa’ uniforms in a first batch delivered by the District Chief Executive (DCE) of Bongo, Peter Ayinbisa Ayamga, a week after a Starr News report on the sad state of the public school.

Deprived of classrooms, a number of the children have their lessons inside a crowded church structure on the school’s premises where the majority of them sit on a sandy floor. Frustrated teachers deliver lessons to the rest of the pupils under some shade trees being used as makeshift classrooms. And the children, when thirsty, suffer a long-distance search for water as there is no potable water source within reach.

Following the news report, the DCE held an emergency meeting with the authorities of the school and subsequently pledged government would facilitate the construction of a nine-unit classroom block promised by a philanthropist, Dr Patricia Essilfie, who founded the Boys and Girls Club of Ghana.

The DCE, exceeding the expectations of the school and of the members of Goo, the community where the school is sited, also gave a firm assurance that the assembly would provide the children with free school uniform the following week and include the school in the Ghana School Feeding Programme (GSFP) list this academic term.

“We are here to redeem a pledge that we made to [the] pupils of Goo-Atandaa Primary School just last week. There was a publication last week about the plight of pupils of this community. Upon seeing the publication, I took it upon myself as the leader of the Bongo District Assembly to visit this school.

“I was in this school and I saw for myself for the first time the conditions the pupils are going through, the conditions the teachers are going through. And I thought that in the 21st century, children of Ghana and pupils of Ghana schools should not be going through those conditions,” said the DCE in his opening remarks on his second visit to the school.

As pupils, teachers and some members of the community listened to him, he recounted what he saw during his first visit: “They sit under trees. They didn’t have furniture. They didn’t have any well-structured classrooms. And they were wearing tattered uniform.”

DCE secures document for classroom block construction

Continuing, the DCE recapped the promises of the first encounter, updated the school and the community on the donor classroom block project and urged everyone— parents and pupils— to take their responsibilities very seriously.

“And I made a pledge to the community— made three different pledges. I promised that in the coming week, I would be here to present school uniform to every child in this school. I went further to pledge that by the grace of God I would talk with the philanthropist who had planned to construct a nine-unit classroom block in the school. The matter had to do with documentation and that the documents of the release of the land were with a private individual. As I talk to you today, the addendum, the document covering the land of this community, is in my possession now.

“What we have to do is to get the Lands Commission to sign the documents and we shall hand over those documents to Dr Patricia, a philanthropist who is going to construct the school [block] for us. I also pledged that when I get an opportunity to select schools to be fed by the Ghana School Feeding Programme, I would add this school. Today, I’m here to redeem one of the pledges,” he stated and, soon after the speech, handed the consignment over to the school’s authorities for immediate distribution to the elated-looking pupils.

Abandoned school borehole project continued after news report

Sadaqa Train Foundation, an Islamic charity organisation headquartered in Accra, virtually ran to the rescue of the thirsty school in 2018 after receiving some distress pictures of the school from some members of the community.

The organisation drilled a borehole for the school but the project came to a standstill when an engineer contracted to execute it, according to some members of the community, abandoned it at the time what was left was only to connect a hand pump to the borehole.

The engineer is reported to have returned to finish the job following Starr News’ first report on the plight of the children. The hand pump has been procured, according to Pascal Ayamga who founded the school, and it is scheduled to be fixed Thursday (tomorrow).

“As a charity organisation, we help deprived areas with food, clothes, educational materials, et cetera. People do request for some of these things. Our good friends sent us a message about the school with some pictures and it was quite touching. For the lack of water, the kids don’t come to school and sometimes they come and leave.

“We all know water is life. Moreover, if the water would also keep them in school, then, we felt we could do something to help them out. When the opportunity came, we contracted a drilling engineer to go there to drill a borehole and give them a hand pump. Hopefully, they will not need any electricity to get the water and the pupils will enjoy the use of the borehole to get potable water,” said the leader of the foundation, Sherif Shaban.

Two pupils, Joel Atadina and Fati Nyaaba, thanked the DCE exceedingly on behalf of their schoolmates for the free uniform. They capped the message of thanks with a polite reminder of the two other promises— food and shelter.