Founding member and President of policy think tank Imani Ghana, Franklin Cudjoe has said that President Akufo-Addo erred in his implementation of the ‘free SHS’ policy.
He said the government should have at least test the waters first before deciding to make it free for everybody.
“The best thing government could have done was to do a means testing to identify those who can’t pay. This will free resources in other to invest in other areas of education in the country”, Cudjoe said.
Cudjoe said such hasty implementation of the policy has resulted in huge funding gaps that will need drastic measures to fill.
His comments come amid speculations over the increase in Value Added Tax (VAT) ahead of the mid-year budget reading this week.
“You [government] do not need the GHC1.2billion bill for Free SHS when you have not planned for it”, he added.
Speculations have been rife that the Minister of Finance intends to announce new taxes in Parliament this week in a bid to raise revenue for free SHS and the National Health Insurance Scheme.
Franklin Cudjoe insisted that IMANI is against any increases in taxes, especially going through some of the freebies that were promised without any proper means testing.
