BY Issah Olegor
The raging controversy over the 2026 Senior High School placement exercise has opened a fresh political front for Education Minister Haruna Iddrisu, with the government now defending him against accusations that President John Mahama has effectively left him to carry the burden of a troubled education system.
The latest defence comes at a time when hundreds of parents and students have been struggling to resolve placement problems at resolution centres, with complaints ranging from unexpected school placements and limited vacancies to long queues and difficulties getting clear answers from officials.
Iddrisu’s spokesperson, Hashmin Mohammed, has rejected suggestions that the Education Minister has been abandoned by President Mahama, describing such claims as “factually wrong, politically convenient and completely unsupported by the evidence.”
His response was directed at comments by former Manhyia North MP Collins Owusu Amankwah, who had suggested that the President had left the Education Minister to battle the mounting challenges in the sector.
But the government’s insistence that the minister has the full backing of the President comes against an increasingly uncomfortable political reality for the NDC administration: the Computerised School Selection and Placement System (CSSPS) is now confronting precisely the kind of problem the party promised voters it would fix while in opposition.
The NDC did not enter the 2024 election campaign without a clear position on Ghana’s secondary education challenges.
While in opposition, then NDC flagbearer John Dramani Mahama repeatedly argued that the Free Senior High School programme needed substantial reforms rather than abandonment.
He promised voters that an NDC government would improve the implementation of Free SHS, expand infrastructure, address overcrowding and review the CSSPS.
In April 2024, Mahama described a review of Free SHS as “a must”, saying the policy had to be strengthened to address its numerous challenges.Months later, during his 2024 campaign, he was even more emphatic about his position on Free SHS.
“If anybody tells you JM is coming to scrap free SHS, that person is a big liar,” Mahama said, promising instead to deliver what he described as a “quality free SHS.”
He also pledged to complete abandoned school projects and expand existing infrastructure to create the capacity needed by the policy.The promises were formally captured in the NDC’s 2024 manifesto.
The party promised to improve Free SHS, provide sustainable funding, abolish the double-track system, complete abandoned E-Blocks, expand infrastructure in existing secondary schools and, significantly, review the Computerised School Selection and Placement System to make it merit-based and address corruption in school placement.
That promise has now become particularly relevant as the Mahama administration struggles to manage the 2026 placement exercise.
Haruna Iddrisu himself had already acknowledged the weaknesses in the placement system before the current controversy erupted.
In October 2025, the Education Minister admitted that the computerised placement system was not functioning as it should and announced plans for a review.
He said some parents and students were justified in their complaints, including cases where students with excellent grades failed to secure preferred schools or programmes.
“I have observed that some parents are unhappy, justified. Some students are unhappy, justified,” he said at the time.
He went further, declaring that the placement system was “not working well for the country” and promising to review its performance over the previous decade and consider a credible alternative. That admission is now being revisited as the 2026 exercise produces another wave of complaints.
The government has introduced a new approach under which BECE candidates were allowed to see their examination results before selecting their second-cycle schools. The policy was intended to enable students to make more informed choices based on their actual performance.
The Education Ministry has argued that the reform was necessary because students previously selected schools before knowing their BECE results, a situation the government said could contribute to mismatches and inefficiencies in placement.
But the new approach has not eliminated the pressure mand has even created a messy situation with over 55,000 students yet to be placed and several students placed facing mismatches.
Instead, critics say it has exposed deeper problems involving the availability of places, the concentration of students in Category A schools and the capacity of the system to accommodate the choices candidates make after seeing their results.
The situation on the ground has become increasingly difficult for many families.
Parents seeking solutions to placement problems in Greater Accra have crowded the National Placement Resolution Centre at GNAT Hall, with reports of long queues, hours of waiting and repeated visits without satisfactory resolution.
Some parents reportedly arrive as early as 4 a.m., spend several hours waiting and are sometimes asked to return the following day. Parents have also raised concerns about wards being assigned to schools they did not expect, including cases involving day schools far from their homes and placements outside the regions where students had hoped to study.
The government has defended the process, insisting that some of the difficulties are caused by limited vacancies in highly competitive schools.
Hashmin Mohammed explained that Category A schools and some Category B institutions had already reached capacity, meaning the National Resolution Centre could not simply move students into those schools.
According to him, Category C schools still have vacancies and therefore offer greater possibilities for students seeking changes.
The ministry has also warned parents against bypassing the CSSPS by approaching schools directly.
Iddrisu has directed heads of Senior High Schools, Senior High Technical Schools and Technical and Vocational Institutes not to admit students outside the approved placement system. Heads who breach the directive risk sanctions, according to the ministry.
It is against this background that the Education Minister’s spokesperson has mounted a vigorous defence of Iddrisu.
Mohammed rejected the argument that the problems with the 2026 CSSPS demonstrate that President Mahama has abandoned the minister.
He said the administration inherited an education system requiring significant reforms and had chosen to confront the problems instead of blaming previous governments.
The spokesperson pointed specifically to the decentralisation of placement resolution centres as one of the government’s interventions to bring assistance closer to parents and students.
He argued that difficulties associated with a national placement exercise should not automatically be interpreted as evidence that the Education Minister lacks presidential support.
“President John Dramani Mahama did not appoint Hon. Haruna Iddrisu to fail. He appointed him to fix problems. And he is supporting him to do exactly that,” Mohammed said.
The political irony, however, is difficult to ignore. The NDC camp spent years in opposition highlighting weaknesses in the education system and promising voters that a return to power would bring reforms.
Its 2024 manifesto specifically identified the CSSPS for review, promising a more merit-based system and action against corruption in school placement.
The party also promised to abolish the double-track system and embark on an emergency infrastructure drive to complete abandoned E-Blocks and expand existing SHS and TVET infrastructure.
Adding another dimension to the debate, former Education Minister and Bosomtwe MP Dr Yaw Osei Adutwum has cautioned against blaming the CSSPS computer itself for the problems.
Speaking on JoyNews, Dr Adutwum argued that the computer merely follows the instructions programmed into it.
“You see, it’s not a computer. It’s the algorithm. It’s what you tell the computer to do,” he said.
His argument is that any meaningful reform must therefore examine the policies, rules and algorithms that determine how students are matched with schools rather than simply replacing or blaming the technological platform.
“So if you want to change anything, it’s the policy that you put in place to regulate the computer that you have to re-examine,” he said.
He maintained that the real scrutiny should be directed at the software development process and the policies used to construct the placement algorithm.
“It’s not so much to blame the computer. A computer is not a human being,” Dr Adutwum said.
