NaCCA Asks government to reprimand Private schools who connive with publishers to sell unapproved textbooks

The chairman of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NaCCA) Professor Kwame Osei Kwarteng has said Private schools who connive with publishers to impose unapproved textbooks should be sanctioned as soon as possible.

Speaking in an interview with Class Morning Show on Monday, Prof Kwarteng said: “I’m using your medium this morning to appeal to parents and proprietors of private institutions – they are the guilty ones; certain individuals have struck deals with these publishers: ‘I’ll give you this percentage if you buy my books, and then they’ll buy and then force it on the parents that this is the recommended book.

“They will go and purchase it and come and pay and, so, it is even entrenched in the school fees – you are supposed to fee this amount of money for textbooks and then they will distribute them to the students.

“So, when the students or parents go for the books, already they’ve paid for it and then it’s issued to them. It’s after it has been issued to them that when they go home that they see some of these anomalies that they have now become concerned about”, Prof Kwarteng noted. 

“So, I think that the private institutions that will be found a sort of colluding with these publishers, equally be punished, they should be sanctioned, they should not be allowed to go scot-free”, he proposed.

For the time being, NaCCA has entreated all publishers of the unsanctioned textbooks: “Golden History of Ghana BS 6 by Mercy Gyaa-Adiyiah and Golden English Basic 4” to remove them from the market as soon as possible.

This was disclosed in a document to the publishers by NaCCA and signed by its Acting Director-General, Mr. John Mensah Anang on Sunday, 14 March 2021.  

NaCCA further stated that it has been informed that the books, “which have not been approved for use in schools, are on the market.”

It continued: “In each of these books, the authors make inappropriate references to personalities and ethnic groups, which is deemed unfortunate and does not conform to the requirement of the Standards-Based Curriculum.”

The stereotypical references, particularly, about Ewes of the Volta Region, have sparked anger among Voltarians on social media.

NaCCA, therefore, asked the publisher, New Golden Publications, to withdraw the books from the market with “immediate effect,” as well as other “unapproved books” that it may have on the market but has not been mentioned in the letter.

The Council further asked the publisher to “issue an unequivocal apology through the electronic, print, and social media.”

It added: “Failure to comply with this directive will attract sanctions.”