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Anti-graft campaigner, Vitus Azeem, says public officials who
used their positions to obtain GETfund scholarships in the past should be made
to pay back the sponsorship fees to the state.
According to him, even though they could not be
blamed for securing the scholarships, they should, out of good conscience,
payback since they were not needy students as stipulated by the Act of the
scholarship scheme.
“These are very unfortunate for a country that
goes out there in search of loans. We need a more serious in-depth
investigation into this matter”.
“The people who gave out these scholarships
should be punished or made to face the law, and those public officials who
received it, even though they cannot be blamed, they should pay back the monies
to the state,” he told Francis Abban on the Morning Starr Monday.
It has emerged that some MPs and government
officials were given scholarships from the GETfund scholarship secretariat to
embark on courses abroad.
The mandate of the GETFund is to grant
scholarships to brilliant but needy Ghanaians.
The list including some members of parliament
and deputy ministers are contained in the audited report of the auditor general
on the Getfund scholarship secretariat.
The Dome MP and procurement minister Adwoa Safo
applied and obtained $12,800 in allowances with $17,004 in tuition fees to
study at the Harvard Kennedy school.
The Executive Secretary of the National Council
for Curriculum and Assessment (NaCCA), Prince HamiduArmah also received £38,400
for living expense in addition to £33,000 for tuition fees, While Education
minister Mathew OpokuPrempeh, who listed at number 38, is receiving $12,800 for
living expenses and $11,200 as tuition fees at security course at Harvard
University.
The Education Minister and the Executive
Secretary of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment have explained
they secured the scholarship before coming into public office.
Meanwhile, the Ghana Education Trust Fund
(GETFund) has stated the scholarships were not given under the tenure of the
current administration.
