Director of Communications for the United Party (UP), Solomon Owusu, has warned that sexual abuse involving students may be more widespread than publicly reported, accusing some opinion leaders and education officials of trivialising complaints instead of ensuring accountability.
Speaking on TV3’s New Day, he said accounts reaching him suggested that some people within the education sector regarded sexual relationships between teachers and students as a form of motivation, a claim he said left him alarmed.
“When this matter broke, I had a friend who works with the Education Minister. As a matter of fact, in the educational sector, they call it motivation,” he said.
“They call what motivation? Sleeping with the youngest is not the motivation for teachers.”
Owusu said he had received a message from a person working at a district education office who claimed to have heard similar accounts. He said the message reinforced his concern that the problem extended beyond the allegations involving Obuasi Senior High Technical School.
“The moment he sent me this, I broke down. I said, my goodness, it’s a motivation to be sleeping with underage girls? Then we are doomed as a country,” he said.
The UP communications director argued that public discussions of individual cases could obscure a wider problem if authorities failed to examine previous complaints and establish whether appropriate action had been taken.
He referred to an earlier case involving allegations against teachers at Juman Senior High School in 2018 and questioned what had become of that matter.
“What happened to that matter?” he asked, calling for greater scrutiny of how allegations of sexual misconduct in schools were handled.
Owusu also warned that abuse experienced during adolescence could have lasting consequences beyond the classroom, including effects on victims’ future relationships.
He stressed, however, that the allegations against the Obuasi SHTS headmaster, Zakaria Abdulai, remained allegations and that conclusions about his conduct would depend on the outcome of investigations.
“If it is proven that indeed Zakaria Abdulai has actually done what he has been accused of doing,” Owusu said, investigators should also consider his long career in education and whether complaints had emerged during his previous postings.
