One student one tablet: Desperation of a sinking government

According to Greek physician Hippocrates: Desperate times call for desperate
measures. Some desperate moments are inevitable, while others are out of arrogance, chicanery, stubbornness, and incompetence.

When a government refuses to listen to sound counselling from academics, experts, CSOs, and the opposition, it eventually becomes susceptible to avoidable challenges that are too late to rectify, thereby switching into a desperate and panicky mood.

That is the exact current state of the Akufo-Addo-Bawumia-led administration.
The government is sinking and desperate to remain afloat. A drowning man
they say will clutch to a straw. The government, in its desperation, has resorted to “vote-buying” tactics under the pretence of enhancing technological
knowledge in our secondary schools.

The importance of technology in today’s world cannot be underestimated. Technology, they say, has turned the world into a global village; therefore, any
effort to ensure that children have access to gadgets to enhance their
Knowledge of technology is a laudable idea. However, such an initiative should be well thought through and executed with the sole purpose of enhancing the knowledge of the students rather than for political gains, as is currently happening.

The government has announced that plans are advanced to distribute free tablets per student in all senior secondary schools across the country. The
Minister of Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, speaking on Joy FM Newsfile
stated that the first batch of 450,000 free student tablets, fully funded through the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFUND), will be distributed in the first week of April.

He stated that the distribution of tablets has been categorized into three
phases, with 450,000 to be distributed to 32 schools to ensure the effective
distribution of a total of 1.3 million tablets. Dr. Adutwum disclosed that the
unit price per tablet is $250. It beggars belief that the government believes
this is a prudent way to improve the educational system when students are
faced with a flurry of challenges, including accommodation, feeding, and
textbook shortages.

The Minister categorically stated that the tablets would be given to the students for free, not to the schools for free. This means that students will keep it after graduating. The question that has been asked by a majority of Ghanaians is, why would the government spend such an amount of money on just one batch of SHS students? How sustainable is this project, and will the next batch also get tablets each?

This led to accusations of possible vote-buying using the tablets as a gift to the final-year students, most of whom will turn 18 before the next limited
registration exercise for the 2024 general elections.

Former President John Dramani Mahama has described the government's distribution of tablets to high school students as a form of vote-buying, and rightly so.
Because if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck, it’s
certainly a duck.

H.E. John Mahama is absolutely right when he said the government initiated this
policy to convince the students who are turning 18 to vote for the NPP in the
December polls.

He stated, “You bring a new curriculum; the children have had no textbooks in
basic schools for the last four years and you think that giving pre-tertiary
Students' tablets are more important. Of course, everybody knows the political
expediency."

"The pre-tertiary students are going to register in May because some of them
are going to be 18 and above. Some are 18 already and they are going to be
the ones voting. So this is a gift to entice them to vote for the current
government. It’s a bribe for them to vote for this government but I mean the
students do not exist in isolation. They live in households and families," Mr. Mahama added.

After this pronouncement by the former president, the Deputy Minister of
Education Hon. Ntim Fordjour was interviewed on Asempa FM on April 5, 2024, by Osei Bonsu (the host). When asked to react to the former president’s
pronouncement, he veered into needless personal attacks on H.E. John Mahama. He was then asked if the tablets would become the bona fide properties of the students, as stated by his boss. He replied, "To my understanding, I think they will leave it for their brothers to also use,” a clear shift from the earlier narratives by his boss, Dr. Adutwum.

The question is, which of the two is telling the truth? Did Ntim Fordjour lie?
because the former president has exposed their vote-buying strategy?

It is important to hold Ntim Fordjour to his promise of ensuring that these
tablets will be used and left for the next batch of students, rather than giving them out as gifts for political gain.

The former president couldn’t have said it any better; the NPP in their
desperation will stop at nothing to cling to power. This project is like a lifeline to a sinking government; they expect to derive hope from where there is none. The students and their families have witnessed the reckless borrowing
and expenditures under this government; therefore, no amount of last-minute
gifts in an election year will sway them; they are not as gullible as the
government thinks.

Moving into the 2024 general elections, Ghanaians should expect to see more
of these freebies from this desperate government, as we were deceived with
the free water prior to the 2020 general elections and later made to pay back
in double. Never trust the promises of a drowning man.