The Member of Parliament for Adansi Asokwa, K.T. Hammond has described the Second Lady’s response to the headteacher of Kukurantumi Presby School’s request for educational materials “as an insult of the highest order.”
K.T. Hammond in an interview on Eyewitness News said, Matilda Amissah-Arthur should apologise for her comment, adding that “if she is not coming to do it herself, the handlers should come and do it.”
The Second Lady during an event to donate computers to the school chastised the headteacher for asking for chalk when the government had donated computers to the school.
“She got it completely wrong. Chalk, ordinary chalk! Who asked them to give school children slippers, shoes and school uniforms? What first they should provide the teachers are the primary tools among which will be chalk. If they don’t have chalk and they have school uniforms, what use is that?” K.T. Hammond fumed.
The Adansi Asokwa legislator also noted that, in his constituency, “the District Director of Education comes to me pleading for money for things like exercise books and chalks.”
This, he said, is because the “government simply has abandoned the education sector of this country” adding that “no wonder the headmistress was asking for chalk. It is a sad day for education in this country.”
While presenting five computers to the Kukurantumi Presby Primary School in the Eastern Region, Mrs Matilda Amissah-Arthur blatantly rejected an appeal for educational materials from the headmistress of the school and accused her of being ungrateful despite major efforts by government to make them comfortable.
“How much is a box of chalk? I won’t give you chalk today, I won’t give you chalk tomorrow,” the Second Lady said.
She also complained about the over-reliance of parents on government’s free school uniforms, saying that government had “spoilt” parents by providing school uniforms which had now made some of them reluctant to provide for their children.
The Second Lady’s comment has provoked anger among Ghanaians who are calling on her to apologise.
