By Bright Agamah
Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in the education sector are calling for effective accountability measures to ensure the government fulfils its commitments to improving education in the country.
This came up at a CSOs Thematic Forum on Education, organised by STAR-Ghana Foundation in Accra. It forms part of preparatory steps towards the government’s planned National Summit on Transforming Ghana’s Education System.
The Manager, Right to Social Services Portfolio at STAR-Ghana Foundation, Raymond Danso, said the forum was to provide the CSOs a platform to coordinate issues which require attention within the education sector.
“The forum is a good platform for CSOs to really coordinate our issues and present them in a coordinated effort. In terms of the issues, we want to amplify so they are not fragmented, but are well coordinated.”
He stressed the need to harmonise CSOs’ position on improving the country’s education.
“We are very certain that the alternatives that we present by way of what has worked in the past and what we think would work would be a good foundation for the government to consider in terms of the new policies and to make commitment, especially around issues of education finance and infrastructure, teacher deployment, development, and so on and so forth.”
Mr. Danso emphasised the critical role of civil society in holding duty-bearers accountable. He called for stronger collaboration between CSOs and policymakers to drive meaningful education reforms.
“We believe that working together is always the best way to be able to get the attention of the government and ensure that issues are addressed comprehensively. For us here, we’ve been working together; we’ll keep working as partners and also keep working with the government.”
He said, “we hope that government will live up to its expectation in terms of the issues that are presented broadly, in terms of the new solutions we need to test and implement to change things that are happening within the educational sector.”
The forum discussed strengthening civil society’s role in monitoring education policies and reforms, leveraging evidence-based advocacy to improve education service delivery, and enhancing partnerships for effective policy implementation.
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