Teacher Trainees across the country will vote against President John Mahama in the upcoming December 7 election, following his decision not to reinstate their cancelled allowance.
According to an Executive member of the Teacher Trainee Association of Ghana, Patrick Antwi Karikari, the students have positioned themselves to vote into power the party which has promised to restore the allowance.
President John Mahama has said he prefers losing the December 7, election than reversing his stance on the cancelled teacher trainee allowance.
Teacher trainees have pleaded with the Mahama-led administration to restore the allowance claiming the absence of it has worsened their economic situation. Government has maintained that scrapping of the allowance affords the state the opportunity of expanding educational infrastructure and increase the provision of required educational materials for effective teaching and learning.
However the opposition New Patriotic Party flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo has slammed the decision and has pledged to restore the allowance if he wins the 2016 elections.
Addressing students at the University of Cape Coast as part of his campaign of the Central Region, President Mahama emphasized that he would not reverse the decision on grounds of principle.
“For me better to lose the election on principle than win it on falsehood and I will not because of political advantage betray the principles I believe in. I believe that this is equitable, this is a matter of social justice. It opens more opportunities for young Ghanaians who want to train as professional teachers and I stand by that decision.”
But responding to the President’s comment on Joy FM, Patrick Antwi Karikari, stated if the president has said he cares less about losing the election on the basis of principle then the students will also do what will bring them relieve and make them happy.
“The cry of teacher trainees is …bring back our allowances. There have been a lot of captions in the media that “bring back our allowances or we show you the exit.” The promise of the NPP bring back the allowances is a happy news to them but they are yet to see the reality of it. So if the president is saying that if teacher trainees are even ready not to vote for him and he’s still not willing to restore the allowance, then alternatively teacher trainees will also try and position themselves at a point to try and bring back the allowances to them.”
Government has encouraged teacher trainees to access Student loans from the Students Loan Trust, but the teacher trainees are not interested, claiming the process of securing the loan is too cumbersome.
