Torrential rains last Saturday night ripped apart 6 schools in Jamasi, in the Sekyere South District of the Ashanti Region. These schools were left roofless, some with broken walls and others with drenched books.
The Jamasi SDA primary, one of the worst affected in the community, had two (2) separate blocks of the school, which houses primaries 6 to 1, the store room and the headmaster’s office utterly destroyed.
The Headmaster of the Jamasi SDA Primary, Mr. Nti Berko narrating the incident, said “we thought that the school building was in good shape, hardly did we know that it wasn’t in a good shape as we estimated. So the rains as they came on Saturday evening ripped off the roofs of about six (6) classrooms, in addition to the six (6) classrooms, the head teacher’s office and the store room of the school, the roofs have all been scrapped off.”
He lamented that, “books and other items were soaked, we have only one computer, and it was also soaked in the rain, items have been destroyed.”
The teachers of the Jamasi SDA Primary School had no option than to put all pupils into the 3-classroom blocks that were not affected. However, teaching and learning had been halted.
A class 6 teacher who spoke with Citi News said no effective instruction can take place under the circumstance.
“We cannot do any effective teaching and learning, because we have to combine all the classes, from class 6 to class 3, and looking at the syllabus, there is nothing in common we can teach them, so everything has been brought to a standstill, and controlling the kids too, because of their numbers ir is going to be very difficult.”
Five other schools under the Jamasi circuit affected by the rainstorm include, Rashadiya RC Primary, Ansaria Primary, LA Experimental, Dawu RC Pimary and the Presby Primary.
At Rashadiya RC Primary, the new 6-unit classroom block, which is still under construction, had its roof also ripped off by the rains.
The Sekyere District Education Director, Mrs. Jocelyn Asante Boamah, who was visiting the affected schools, said “we are now accessing, we have to get a holistic view of what is happening, then we can take a solid decision.”
She added that, “if it becomes necessary to even go on break for a day or two, especially where there are younger children in kindergarten and lower primary, we will do that.”
The Presiding Member of the Assembly, Hon. Michael Opoku, said “there is going to be an emergency meeting today (Tuesday), myself as presiding member, the coordinating director and the education director, and we will invite the NADMO coordinator, because we have asked them to go round to access and bring their reports. Based on their report, we’ll get to know those immediate needs the assembly has to come in to deal with …we’ll look into the assembly’s coffers and find out whether we can get some money and then get some relief items.”
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(Via: CitiFM Online Ghana)
