Students in Northern Region fear missing out on BECE over floods

Some students in the Kpalba circuit in the Saboba District of the Northern Region fear being unable to sit for the 2020 edition of the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) due to the flooding issue in the area.

According to the BECE candidates, centres where they are supposed to write the exams have become impassable due to the floods.

About 200 candidates who are to sit for the BECE beginning Monday, September 14, 2020, fear they may not be able to participate in the final examination if the flood does not recede.

They are thus calling on the government to either provide them with means of crossing over to Saboba, should the situation persist, or allow them to take the exams in their schools.

“We are afraid of the water bodies here. How are we going to write our first paper on Monday? We are pleading with the District Assembly to either find a means to get us to Soboba or allow us to write in our school,” one of the students pleaded.

“We cannot cross the water and go and write the exams. If WAEC does not allow us to write in our school, we will miss out on the BECE,” another candidate said.

What happened?

Torrential rainfall in the Northern part of Ghana coupled with spillage from the Bagre Dam in Burkina Faso left hundreds of farmlands submerged.

The bridge was flooded to the waist level covering over 1-km stretch of road.

Six lives have been lost due to this.

Almost every year, the flood gates of the Bagre dam are opened and this usually affects residents along the White and Black Volta rivers.

Spillage of excess water from the dam is as part of a routine safety measure to ensure that the water is kept below the safe operating level of the dam in order to prevent it from collapsing.