Parliament issues directives on Obuasi SHTS abuse scandal, demands fast-tracked prosecution
The Parliamentary Select Committees on Human Rights, Gender, Children and Social Welfare, and Education have issued a joint statement with decisive directives following a briefing by the Ministers for Education and Gender, Children and Social Protection on the Obuasi Senior High Technical School (SHTS) abuse scandal.
The Committees met jointly with the two Ministers to scrutinize their immediate intervention strategies, assess the state of criminal investigations, and establish accountability measures to protect survivors.
The session follows revelations of systemic sexual abuse, exploitation, and institutional failures at Obuasi SHTS.
Parliament commended both ministries for their swift preliminary actions, including the immediate interdiction of the headmaster, Zakaria Abdulai, and the deployment of psychological support teams. However, the Committees said the scale of the trauma exposed by investigative journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni requires an unprecedented, aggressive, and highly coordinated state response.
The Committees directed the Ministry of Interior and the Inspector General of Police to expedite criminal proceedings against the interdicted headmaster, and demanded that the judiciary treat the case with maximum urgency to ensure swift justice and serve as a stark national deterrent.
They also warned religious bodies/leaders and political institutions to desist from frustrating the criminal justice system and allow the system to take its course.
The Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, in partnership with the Ghana Health Service, will continue to offer clinical psychologists and medical professionals to victims of Obuasi SHTS, with comprehensive, trauma-informed counselling and medical monitoring guaranteed to all survivors at the state’s expense.
The Ministry of Education was directed to strictly enforce anti-victimization policies, with the identity of every survivor to remain legally protected. Any student, parent, or staff member who subjects survivors to social stigma or intimidation will face immediate prosecution under the Children’s Act.
Parliament said the current administrative pathways for reporting sexual misconduct within the Ghana Education Service (GES) are broken, and directed the Ministry of Education to co-design an independent, third-party reporting mechanism that bypasses local school heads entirely, allowing students to report abuse directly to a centralized, protected registry.
They added that the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, together with appropriate institutions, should also come up with a Register for Sexual Offenders, which the Joint Committee believes will serve as a deterrent to others.
They charged the Ministry of Education to immediately launch a sweeping, independent safeguarding audit across all boarding and day second-cycle institutions in Ghana to assess student safety, housing vulnerability, and staff compliance with the GES Code of Conduct, adding that the Ministry should also partner institutions it deems fit to train all teachers on the GES Code of Conduct.
The Ministries of Education and Gender, Children and Social Welfare were further directed to build a robust system to ensure a coordinated approach to nip such issues in the bud on school campuses and help address them when they happen.
The Joint Committees said they will maintain active oversight over the process, with both Ministers to provide regular progress briefings to Parliament until criminal prosecutions are concluded and structural reforms fully implemented.
By Edem Mensah-Tsotorme
