Majority Chief Whip, Frank Annoh-Dompreh has clarified that the government has settled a significant portion of the debt owed to the West Africa Examination Council (WAEC).

This comes after WAEC announced that it might have to postpone the upcoming Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) due to financial constraints.

The Director of Public Affairs at WAEC, John Kapi, stated that the council needs about GH₵90 million to conduct the exams.

Read also: BECE might be postponed if gov’t fails to release GH₵90m – WAEC

He clarified that while the exam papers have been printed, there are no funds available to distribute them and send WAEC officials to monitor the exams. Consequently, the examination might be postponed until the funds are received.

Reacting to the issue in Parliament on Friday, June 21, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament for Bole Bamboi, Yusif Sulemana, urged the Education Minister to focus on clearing the debt.

He expressed concern about WAEC's financial difficulties and emphasised the urgency of resolving the issue.

“Today as we speak, WAEC is complaining that they do not even have money to conduct BECE exams. That is what we should draw our attention to. We don’t see that as urgent and we don’t see that as an issue we should address immediately.

“BECE will be written very soon and WAEC is unable to raise money to do it and nobody is talking about that. I think that the Minister should be interested in raising money for WAEC to be able to conduct BECE exams for our children"he said.

However, the Majority Chief Whip, Frank Annoh-Dompreh revealed in parliament that he has been informed, along with the Minority leadership, that there has been a significant release of up to GH₵80 million out of the nearly GH₵100 million debt.

“Myself and the Chief Whip, we followed up and we spoke to the Minister of State, Honourable Abena Osei-Asare. She got back to the Ministry, gave all the cheques, and confirmed that indeed they have made a significant release.

“We are told an amount of 80 million has been released… so please, the matter has been dealt with,” he said.

But the Minority Chief Whip, Kwame Governs Agbodza challenged these claims, insisting that the NDC Minority caucus is not aware that such an amount has been paid.

He said he heard the Minister of State, Abena Osei-Asare, saying that some monies were paid to WAEC yesterday [Thursday], and additional funds would be paid today [Friday], amounting to 40 million cedis.

“On this paper that she gave us the copy, what is owed WAEC for BECE is 93 million Ghana Cedis. If you pay even 40 million, you are almost half way so I’m not aware she said 80 million.

“If they paid him 80 million fine, because I saw her insisting they paid 40 million and it's the total amount of money,” he said.