A former Chairman of Parliament’s Finance Committee, Dr Mark Assibey Yeboah has asked government to terminate the School Feeding Programme.
According to him, the cancellation of the policy would reduce the state’s expenditure.
While contributing to a discussion on JoyNews’ AM Show, on Wednesday, the former New Juaben South MP said the rosy picture being painted by the government about the programme is fictional since it has been ineffective in recent times.
“Now the caterers go to the school twice a week, because the funds they have are not feeding the kids. We continue to pretend that we are feeding the kids at school, they are malnourished, the food is not good.
“Cancel it [School Feeding Programme]. It will save you about a billion cedis,” he stated on Wednesday.
Dr. Assibey Yeboah also proposed that teacher and nursing training allowances be revoked. In his view, the initiative has lost its usefulness.
Reacting to supposed leaked excerpts of the yet-to-be-presented 2023 Budget, he urged Ghanaians to expect a challenging year ahead and the impact of the tax measures on revenue.
“You remember I said 2023 is going to be a difficult year. We should brace up. On the revenue side, these tax measures are going to come in. They are going to bite hard.”
However, he voiced his dissatisfaction with the efforts put in place to reduce public spending, as he thought little to nothing is being done about that.
This is why he suggested the cancellation of the School Feeding Programme and the allowance for teacher and nurse trainees.
On the same discussion, MP for South Dayi, Rockson Nelson-Dafeamekpor, suggested that rather than stopping the School Feeding Programme, government should use locally produced foodstuffs to feed the children.
“We must stop using foreign rice to feed our children. We are sinking in so much money. We give monies to caterers who will go and buy Thai rice to feed our children. Even the feeding is not done properly,” he stated.
