The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has reassured the clergy of his desire to partner the church to foster development, reiterating the role the church can play to curb the indiscipline creeping into the schools.
According to the flag bearer of the New Patriotic Party, indiscipline is gaining so much roots in the schools and it was time the churches were brought on board in the management of these institutions to sanitise the system.
In an engagement with the clergy as part of his Greater Accra tour Tuesday, June 04, 2024, the Vice President noted that the contribution of the church cannot be overemphasised considering the numerous projects it has undertaken over the years.
“So I want a closer partnership, especially in the area of our management of our schools. I think that we need to have a conversation in the school, in the management of the schools, because indiscipline is creeping in too much.
“The value system that we were growing up on is we are losing it, bringing in so much indiscipline. But we know when they say a Presbyterian upbringing, you know what it means, isn’t it? Yes, that’s what they will tell you. I mean, the discipline I think that faith-based organizations bring is very different,” he stated.
Collaboration with faith-based organisations key to national development – Bawumia
He also highlighted the need to grant the churches tax exemptions when undertaking some of these projects that contribute to development, just as it is done for the external development partners.
“I always make the mistake to think that if you talk of development partners, it’s the
foreign people like you. You talk of Oxfam or USAID. They are okay, but they are not our foremost partners.
“The foremost partners in my view are the church and the faith-based organizations. Look at the number of schools the church built. Look at the number of hospitals. Look at the number of universities. If you took all of these schools, hospitals out of our Ghanaian country, took them all out, we would collapse. That is the nature of, that is the reality.
So when you are looking at your development partners and you say that, oh, these are
foreign development partners, so when they come to build something, you give them tax
exemptions. But when the church goes to build the same thing, they have to pay import
duty. I say this is wrong.
“We have to change it. We’ll give the church the same tax exemptions as we are giving to
the external development partners. We have to encourage the church to do more because this is what we do,” the Vice President said.
