Rastafarian Saga: Court ruling will help review policies, says GES

The Ghana Education Service (GES) has stated that the ruling of the high court asking Achimota Senior High School to admit Rastafarian students will help a great deal for the service to review its policies.

Speaking to Nana Yaa Mensah on The Asaase Breakfast Show on Tuesday 1 June 2021, Dr Kwabena Tandoh, the deputy director-general of the GES said the service will not countenance any form of stigmatisation against any student in the country.

“For GES even before the Rastafarian case was brought against Achimota School, we’ve had conversation around looking wholly at our school policies. We still have a policy against technology in terms of devices by young men and women in our schools,” he said.

Dr Tandoh added: “And so this only justifies or second and affirms where we are already thinking about in terms of relooking at our policies and I think that the case will allow us to be wide in our review process in terms of our policies, while understanding what we need to maintain in terms of our traditions, culture and our beliefs within the confines of our constitution.”

Use of electronic devices

He said said policies by the GES on use of devices in schools will also be reviewed as government provides Wi-Fi across government schools.

“And we have seriously been talking about them. We need to review them, because we now have Wi-Fi… so it will be fair to have Wi-Fi enabling devices to help students to learn. So before this case we have been having serious conversation around full policy review on how our schools run and operate and how we intend to use those policies to support the ethos of schools that we run.”

Background

The Human Rights Court in Accra on Monday (31 May) ordered officials at Achimota Senior High School to admit one of the Rastafarian students, Tyron Iras Marhguy.

Tyrone Marhguy, who was denied admission together with one other Rastafarian student sued the school because he was denied admission at the Achimota School because of his dreadlocks in order to affirm his fundamental human right.

The court in granting the application held that the refusal of Achimota School to admit Master Marhguy on grounds that he was wearing dreadlocks amounted to a breach of his fundamental human rights and his right to education. SOURCE: Fred Dzakpata/asaaseradio.com