Trending on Accra’s radio stations now is the state of Ghana’s education system.  Mostly, people are outraged! Majority of public school students who wrote the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) failed. For those who don’t know it is that exams junior high school graduates write at the end of three years. It is a really important exam, it determines where the graduates will end on the pecking order. This is because without a certificate a graduate cannot  a job anywhere in Ghana.

Basically students who fail to make it to senior high school fail are simply headed to the academy of menial jobs, crime and poverty.

Most of them couldn’t even score the lowest aggregate of thirty.  And these are not just students who attended schools in villages but those in cities like Takoradi, Ghana’s Dubai too.

The Vice President attributes the high level of failure poor parenting and lazy teachers.  The Volta Regional Minister whose region sparked the debate blames truancy, and speaking on radio the other day, some of the students blamed their teachers;

One girl said “the teachers do not teach us well.”

Others have mentioned lack of infrastructure, lack of textbooks in schools, no teaching and learning materials and the overworked and underpaid teachers. It is all true

And this isn’t the first time we are having a national conversation about the number of schools scoring zero in exams or the state of education. We did last year when junior and senior high school were released, then when a new research indicated that sixty-three percent of pupils in primary schools could not read or write. There is been talk about the quality of graduates the Universities and other tertiary institutions are churning out too. They are not any better.

Clearly Ghana’s education system has enormous problems, yet governments after government have applied the ‘band aid’ method of problem solving. You know the situation where they notice a bleed, they apply the plaster.

So primary school children and Junior High school students have been given an assorted tray of freebies, first there is that unenforced free compulsory basic education, free food for primary schoolers, then free school uniforms and exercise books and the latest and most ridiculous, free laptops to some selected student.

And they have brilliant reasons for these first-aid applications, the free school uniforms is still dicey for me but the free compulsory education is supposed to keep pupils in school till they graduate Junior High School, and in the words of current Minister of Education the laptop “initiative seeks to equip and empower basic school teachers and pupils with modern ICT equipment and skills to enhance their knowledge and capability in the use of modern technology.”  This is quite hilarious, given that teachers and pupils cannot enhance their knowledge without textbooks and syllabuses.

The freebies will not improve the quality of education.  Free school uniforms will not reduce the number of pupils selling on the streets in their school uniforms. Neither will free exercise books improve pupils’ reading or writing abilities. It may win the Minister and her party some votes but it will not help increase the literacy rate.

In fact, no one cares what pupils wear to school, they can wear anything so far as they can get a desk to write on, textbooks to guide them and teachers who are equipped and trained for the new world.

It is quite simple, when you have more than half your basic school population dropping out, you don’t hand out free things, you transform their schools so they will love to stay or be there.  And when they end up failing the way the recent graduates did, you review your education policy.

In Accra not an hour goes by on local radio and television without an advert of a bank promoting some sort of potion for the financial ills of residents. The banks here will lend you money for almost everything these days. There is money for mortgages, cars, weddings, funerals, televisions and even blenders. The adverts are to attract new customers and prevent existing ones from switching.

It didn’t use to be like that, the banks didn’t really care about whether one moved banks or not. There weren’t that many banks to start with and there weren’t a lot on offer either.  In 2002 when I went to University in Cape Coast, it was almost impossible to open an account at the local Barclays bank. There were so many requirements that would put any student off but we had no option than to maintain a two hundred cedis minimum balance. It was the same process at the next bank.

I have no idea how businesses survived but I suspect they didn’t get it any easier than we did as students. But there were no complaints because no radio or television adverts had promised us the best products and services if we banked with them.  We endured their crappy services and products till the Nigerian banks came into town along with the South Africans, the Indians, the Libyans and some new Ghanaian banks.

They did things differently. There was the fact one can open an account with no money. There are mortgages, at extortionist rates but we will thrill to any bank that offers the funeral and wedding loans. Ghanaians loves to party and nothing says a good party than a huge ‘going away’ party for the dead.  And to set them apart, some banks promised impeccable customer service. Or so we thought.

In my first bank, displayed in bold print over the counter is the Managers number. It reads, ‘for complaints, call the manager on 1234,’ sadly attempts to lodge complaint about their non-performing ATM machines on phone have gone unanswered. The number works, only no one answers, not the manger, not a PA, or an automated answering service is there to hear about their poor services. The endless treks around town to find a working ATM wasn’t the reason why I changed banks.

It was when they restricted the use of their visa cards from any online transaction. Apparently online fraud was high and they couldn’t protect me or trust that Amazon.com was secure enough, so they canceled it without checking to see if I had made any orders.

I am unto my third bank now, and I am considering a move already. I get paid between the 15^th and 20^th of every month and usually the money should get to Ghana in three days.  But it doesn’t, my last salary was sent on the 17^th and I received it on the 15^th of the following month.  I have  tried to put up with all their inadequacies like the long wait in the banking hall, the faulty ATMs-an affliction all the banks here seem to share and the ‘you are-not-to ask-for-manager’ unless you want are worth millions attitude.

I’m not the only one who receives appalling  service from my bank and yet sees adverts saying otherwise. I have heard horror stories from family and friend,  from high interest rates on loans, ATM fraud,  slow service, delays in banking halls to rude client service personnel.  And like me, these people do not care for fancy adverts, they just want quality service.