The Registrar of the Scholarship Secretariat, Alex Asafo-Agyei, has shed light on what he describes as troubling developments in the administration of government scholarships under the previous Akufo-Addo-led administration.
Speaking in an interview on Nhyira FM’s Kurom Yi Mu Nsem, Mr. Asafo-Agyei revealed that some beneficiaries exploited loopholes in the system, including spouses of awardees requesting financial support when they were not the primary recipients of scholarships.
He cited a case where the husband of a beneficiary, who travelled abroad on a spousal scholarship, wrote to the Secretariat requesting funds for his return ticket to Ghana while his wife continued her studies.
“The Secretariat had catered for all their travel costs, yet he wrote to us that we should buy him a ticket back home to attend to a family issue,” Mr. Asafo-Agyei noted.
The Registrar also pointed to questionable spending on short courses, disclosing that one beneficiary received £4,650 for a two-week programme, along with £2,000 in living allowances. “Some of the courses are very funny. There was one described as Developing Future Leaders. Another, Management Development for Executives in 2023, was awarded to one Hilda Afia Aduako Acheampong,” he added.
Mr. Asafo-Agyei suggested that such cases reflected a lack of proper scrutiny in awarding scholarships, stressing the need for reforms to ensure government resources are directed towards programmes that yield genuine benefits for the nation.
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