June 1

WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH
DAILY HERITAGE FRIDAY, JUNE 1, 2018
05
Editorial
Medical and Dental Council has failed Ghanaians
THE GHANA Medical and
Dental Council has admitted that
the embattled director of the
Advanced Body Sculpt, known
as Obengfo Hospital, Dr Dominic
Obeng-Andoh, was not licensed
to practise at the facility.
According to the Registrar and
Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
of the Medical and Dental
Council, Dr Eli Atikpui, Dr
Obeng-Andoh was not licensed
to practise at the facility where
Stacy Offei Darko, a Deputy
Chief Executive Officer of the
National Entrepreneurship Innovation
Programme, met her
untimely death.
“We have made our position
clear, Dr Obeng-Andoh has no
valid licence," he told Joy News.
“We cannot conclude that it is
negligence at this point in time,
but it sounds strange. The
chronology of events described
by the mother suggests something
terrible happened, and not
to the standards of a medical and
health facility.”
The Registrar also recounted
that between 2012 and 2013, Dr
Obeng-Andoh appeared before
the Council, was found guilty of
medical malpractice, and suspended
for three years.
Dr Atikpui also said though
the facility was shut down on two
occasions by the Council, the facility
somehow still operated.
“Why was an institution that
was shut down by a regulator reopened
without recourse to the
provisions of the law?” the CEO
quipped.
The DAILY HERITAGE
is disappointed in the Council
for asking questions when it
ought to be providing answers to
why the facility, which was operated
by someone without licence,
was still in operation.
If the Council had done its
work well, Stacy would not have
gone there for medical service in
the first place.
The Council should accept
that it failed woefully because but
for the untimely death of Stacy,
the Advanced Body Sculpt
would still have been in operation.
The time to sit up is now. The
Council should do its work well
and close down all facilities that
should not be in operation and
not wait for ‘disaster’ before acting.
Pupils write
exam on laps
BY PHILIP ANTOH
philip.antoh@dailyheritage.com.gh
• At Obakrowa M/A Basic
School due to lack of desks
• A cross section of pupils in the classroom
IN THEIR quest to catch up with the rest
of their counterparts in the capital city
and other parts of the country, pupils of
Obakrowa M/A Basic School at Ashalaja
in the Ga South Municipality in the
Greater Accra Region have resorted to writing
on their laps in the classroom.
This is because the school lacks adequate
furniture to serve the over 460 pupils in the
institution.
The learning condition is so bad as at least
three pupils are made to share a single dual
desk.
The school, which was established in 1960,
has a current population of 460 with only 40
dual desks forcing teachers to ask parents to
provide their pupils with dual desks on admission.
Speaking to the DAILY HERITAGE,
the head teacher of the school, Mr Alex
Adzikunu, said the condition was affecting academic
work because pupils who write on
their laps were always slow.
Mr Adzikunu said Obakrowa M/A Basic
School, which is made up of kindergarten, primary
and junior high school, always falls on
plastic chairs from Obakrowa Presbyterian
Church of Ghana for their daily teaching and
learning.
He added that when a pupil goes for the
plastic chair because of lack of desks, the
pupil is compelled to put the book on his/her
lap to write an exam or class text.
“Because the few desks in the school are
made to accommodate four pupils instead of
two, when it comes to individual assessment it
is very difficult to assess. Parents who cannot
afford GH100.00 dual desk and GH 70.00
mono-desk for their children are forced to
look elsewhere,” Mr Adzikunu stated.
The head teacher said most parents who
could not bear the agony their children go
through withdraw and enrol them elsewhere.
Mr Adzikunu said the school had only 20
desks until it received an extra 20 from the
municipal education director, Mr Felicia Okai,
sometime ago.
He is, therefore, calling on corporate
Ghana and philanthropists to assist the school
with dual desks to ensure a conducive environment
for teaching and learning.
The learning
condition is so bad
as at least three
pupils are made to
share a single
dual desk.