Nkwatia Presby Secondary/Commercial closed down

Nkwatia (E/R), Mar. 17, GNA- The Board of Directors and authorities of the Nkwatia Presbyterian Secondary/Commercial School (NKWASCO) have closed down the school indefinitely and all the 1,021 students sent home following students' disturbances in the school on Sunday.

A five-member committee, chaired by Nana Boakye, a member of the Board had been appointed to investigate the circumstances that led to the disturbances.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview at the school on Tuesday, the Headmistress, Mrs Lydia Agyapong Afrifa said at about 8.30 p.m. on March 14, this year, the Students' Representative Council (SRC) presented a resignation letter signed by their President to the school authorities.

She said after presenting the letter, some of the students started shouting on the compound, while other groups destroyed the lighting system in the classrooms, broke a number of louver blades and the television antenna at the Headmistress' residence and the main gate of the girls' dormitory.

The Headmistress said when the Board of Directors and school authorities met the students the following day, they failed to listen to them and rather hooted at the Board Chairman, Professor J.S.K Ayim, a former Vice-Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).

The Nkawkaw Divisional Police Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP), Ms Rose Bio Atenga told the GNA that when she summoned all the prefects to her office at Nkawkaw, they complained that the authorities failed to give them the due respect and punished them for any minimal offence.

Mr Lawrence Agyeman, an Assistant Director in-charge of Second-Cycle Schools in the Eastern Region, who also visited the school to assess the situation, said an emergency Parent Teacher Association meeting would be held on Saturday, March 20, to help solve the problem. The PTA Chairman, Mr Ben Oware Antwi commended the Headmistress for a number of development projects she has initiated since she assumed duty in August, last year to improve the development of the school.

He said through her efforts, the PTA had purchased a 120-million-cedi 33-seater bus, furniture worth 33 million cedis and 18 million cedis worth of students beds while the MP for the area, Mr Eugene Atta Agyapong had assisted the school to purchase two polytanks worth 24 million cedis.