‘Blame Nana B for rampaging WASSCE candidates’ – Daniella Mathias

A member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) communication team has slammed National Youth Organiser of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), Henry Nana Boakye (Nana B), for the unruly behaviour of some current West Africa Senior School Certificate Examinations (WASSCE) candidates.

Daniella Mathias alleged that the teenagers went on rampage and destroyed school properties because Nana B had assured them the past questions bought for them by the government would come during their final exams.

“President Akufo-Addo has no moral right to blame the students because his own Nana B is the cause of the student riots we have recorded in some Senior High Schools. Nana B went to the schools and campaigned to the teenagers and told them they’d be allowed to cheat inthe examination hall."

“Nana B and his people assured them the past questions [the government had distributed to them] would be seen in their final exam, so after it turned out the questions were different from what they had learned they had to protest,” Mathias said.

This comes after the Ghana Education Service (GES) dismissed and barred some 14 students from writing their remaining papers over their involvement in acts of indiscipline and vandalism during their WASSCE.

But the former Presidential Staffer in an interview on Power FM told Inside Politics host Mugabe Maase that the ruling NPP, in a bid to get the students to vote for them in the 2020 polls, informed them the exams would be flexible so they can write and pass as pioneers of the government’s free SHS policy.

“The NPP led by Nana B went to the schools to do politics and this is the outcome – the vandalism and indiscipline we are seeing. It is not the fault of the students although I condemn their action,” Madam Mathias noted.

She further kicked against the decison of the Ghana Education Service to prevent the students from writing their remaining papers but hastened that “they are young and need counselling.”

To her, the teenagers were “lied to” and had no option than to misbehave following their disappointment.

Mahama’s Reactions

Meanwhile the NDC 2020 flagbearer, John Dramani Mahama, has attributed the incident to the decision by the government to buy them past questions.

He said that the WASSCE candidates believed that the past questions bought for them by the government would come during the exams hence their disappointment and the kind of behaviour they put up.

“All of us pass O’Level and A’Level. We used to go to West Africa Examinations Council to buy past questions ourselves. Government never gave it to us. And we bought it because you can look at the past questions and they can help you to rehearse towards the exams but when the government goes and buys it and gives it to them, it gives them the idea that these are the questions that are going to come. And they go and sit in the exams hall and those questions they studied for are not in the paper, then this is the kind of thing you will see happening,” Mr Mahama said when he called on the Overlord of Dagbon, Ya-Na Mahama Abukari (II) at his palace at Yendi on Friday.

He said during his tenure and under his Education Minister of Education, Professor Jane Nana Opoku-Agyemang, who is his running mate for the elections, “Ghana saw the best WASSCE results. Ghana saw the best BECE results in our history.”

“We will come back to government. We will make sure that our children are well prepared and well-taught so that they will go into that exams hall with confidence and not feel that the only way they can pass is to cheat in the examinations,” he added.