President Akufo-Addo will be deceiving himself if he thinks implementing Free SHS programme will keep him in power for another four years or more, former president John Mahama’s spokesperson has said.

Joyce Bawah Mogtari said the programme which is only one campaign promise out of many made by then-candidate Akufo-Addo is not enough reason for Ghanaians to retain him and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in power.

“He made many promises about alleviating poverty, give them (Ghanaians) better roads, build more schools but none of these promises, so far, have been realized.

“Free SHS is a constitutional provision. It is enshrined in the constitution that we must ensure progressively free senior high school education…I do not think that is enough to keep the president in power even for the next four years, let alone 10 years,” she said on Joy FM’s Newsnight show, Tuesday.

Her comments come after President Akufo-Addo mocked the opposition National Democratic Congress’ (NDC) plan to scrap the Free SHS programme when it comes to power in 2020

The president, who is on a two-day tour of the Upper East region said Ghanaians will not entrust power into the hands of the NDC because of their determination to cancel the Free Senior High School policy.

He said, “I know that there are people in this country who don’t want this policy, who have been campaigning against this policy. They are dreaming that they are going to come back to power to cancel the policy. I want them to know that they are not coming back to power, and the Free Senior High School (SHS) policy has come to stay.

President Akufo-Addo spoke at the Bolgatanga SHS

“They still haven’t woken up from their dreams; they dreamt in 2016 that they were on course for victory. They did not know that the Ghanaian people were no longer interested in entrusting them with power. They still haven’t woken up from their dreams”.

But Mrs Bawah Mogtari believes there’ll be no need for a waking up because Ghanaians have already made their decision to vote the Akufo-Addo administration out and hand the country to John Mahama and the NDC again.

She chastised the president for what she describes as the poor implementation of the Free SHS programme.

She believes the Akufo-Addo administration would have done a better job if they had they followed former president Mahama’s vision of putting the necessary infrastructure in place before rolling out the programme.

“Former President Mahama started the construction of the community day senior high schools. The idea was to decongest our senior high schools it was rubbished, totally denigrated and condemned. Now we still have the double-track system which the former administration worked very hard to remove.

“Many things will keep a government in power and I believe that many of the things that they promised have not materialised but if the president believes that he can fly on the wings of Free SHS to ensure his opponents never come back to power, then I believe he is deceiving himself and maybe there are some people refusing to advise him,” she said.