…But GES allays fears of public
THE Ghana Education Service has dismissed public outcry that it is planning to introduce “explicit sexual” education to children as young as four years under the guise of Comprehensive Sexual Education (CSE).
The service has been heavily criticised by the public especially on social media after some unverified materials popped up on the internet over the weekend as being part of the course materials for the new subject expected to take effect next academic year.
The critics contend that the subject was a springboard for the advocacy for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) rights.
One of the fierce critics of LGBT, Moses Foh-Amoaning, the Spokesperson for the National Coalition for Proper Human Sexual Rights and Family Values, believes the CSE was an active strategy by the LGBT movement to get acceptance.
“(The strategy) is always not open for you to see, it is very subliminal and they come in all sorts of ways…they have noticed that in Africa, our culture and our religion, we are very strong…so they are going through the education. Education is strong because if you win the mind then you can win the heart,” he said.
But the GES in a statement issued in Accra and copied the Ghanaian Times said the new Standard Based Curriculum being implemented had nothing to do with LGBT issues, masturbation or explicit display or labelling of intimate body parts.
“The CSE does not seek to throw out the advocacy for sexual abstinence but rather seeks to reinforce it. The goal of CSE is to equip school children with age and cultural appropriate information to explore and nurture positive values and attitudes towards their sexual and reproductive health and to develop self-esteem, respect for human rights and gender equality,” the statement signed by Casandra Twum Ampofo, Head, Public Relations said.
It further seeks to help students to make informed decisions about their health, with emphasis on Ghanaian cultural values and norms, the statement said.
According to the GES, member states of the United Nations, the statement said were mandated to roll out CSE in accordance with their cultural norms and values.
“It is therefore wrong to insist that CSE as practical in Europe or North America has the same structures and content as is being rolled out in Ghana,” the statement stressed.
The GES, the statement noted was a state agency and “will not under any circumstance implement any programme which goes contrary to the legal, cultural norms, values and beliefs of the Ghanaian people.”
Meanwhile the Head of the NaCCA, Prince Hamid Armah, has said the materials making rounds on social media platforms purporting to be course material for the subject were false.
“As the head of the Curriculum and Assessment Council of the Ministry Education, I say with authority that none of the materials being shared on social media has been approved for use in schools, or does the curriculum for KG-Primary contain any such material.
“In plain language none of the 13 curriculum contains the CSE being deliberately imposed as part of the new standard-based curriculum,” he wrote on his facebook wall.
“In fact, there’s no single textbook or supplementary material approved for the new curriculum. Authors are still submitting whilst our team of assessors are still assessing the materials received so far…….any document not approved by NaCCA, by law, can never be used in any school in Ghana.
“The PPAG material being circulated has not passed our material assessment benchmark, if they are to find themselves in our schools,” he added.
