In Ghana, children beg on streets for education

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Children in fishermen's village, Cape Coast

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CAPE COAST, GHANA - If 10 year-old Sarah Anna could just find $12, her life would profoundly change.

But in the fishermen's slums of this west African village, $12 is a fortune, and many families here simply cannot afford the cost of tuition and books.

Ghana, which had one of the best education systems in sub-Saharan Africa, has not been able to keep pace with the demand for literacy. Although the government promises to add more no-fee public schooling, the reality is quite harsh.

In Cape Coast, it's not uncommon to find children begging not for food, but for school fees.

"Even young school-age children understand that education is a matter of survival," said Ato Dadzie, Ghana director of Journalists for Human Rights, a Canadian non-governmental organization. "They know their chances are slender."

This reporter was approached by several elementary and high-school aged children, looking for assistance with their tuition fees.

Francis Erhun, a 19-year old high school graduate, ran to his home to
get his tattered report card to prove that he deserved to be considered
for a university education. His card showed he received 3 "excellents",
2 "very goods" and one "satisfactory" (in English Studies) for his
final semester.

For him, there was only one possible source to find the 3 million Cedis (worth about $330US) per year for university tuition - from a visiting tourist.

His job at a local cyber cafe paid him approximately $1.25US per day, and much of that was going to pay the elementary school fees for his sister, Comfort.

It used to be different, a few years ago, when Ghana boasted the best education system in western Africa, and there are still beneficiaries of that system to be found.

"You can still find older women in Cape Coast who managed to get a high school education," said Daniel Owusu, an art dealer in Ghana's capital of Accra. Owusu grew up in a small village of 70 in central Ghana, but was shipped off to live with an uncle in Cape Coast so he could attend school.

"My father, a poor farmer, knew that the only chance I had in life was to be educated," he said. "So he made incredible sacrifices to pay for my education. Today, the way fees are, that would be impossible."

There are several organizations that collect donations for education, such as The Ghana Education Project.

But it is possible to directly pay for school fees for individual children. However, there is no government-sponsored program that facilitates such a practice, as far as this reporter knows.

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