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In 2020, a handle on X (formerly Twitter) claimed that President Akufo-Addo had awarded scholarships to 60,000 students during the 2020/2021 academic year.
This claim was accompanied by a press statement from the Ghana Scholarship Secretariat dated December 1, 2020, which indicated the number of beneficiaries and associated expenditures from 2017 to 2020.
Did the president give scholarships to 60,000 students in 2020? Was it recorded in our budget that year? @factcheck_ghana pic.twitter.com/OeUVTnOc4q
— Receipts Guy (@receiptsguy) August 13, 2024
The press release stated that the Secretariat awarded 45,000 continuing students scholarships and 15,000 Free SHS graduates were estimated to benefit, bringing the total number of beneficiaries to 60,000.
Similar posts were made by other accounts on the platform, with some quoting 65,000 beneficiaries instead of the 60,000 mentioned in the earlier post. (see here and here).
These posts were made on December 1, 2020, a few days before the 2020 general election suggesting a coordinated effort to garner support for President Nana Akufo-Addo, who was seeking a re-election at the time.
Recently, this post resurfaced on X, shared by another account, prompting Fact-Check Ghana to investigate the validity of the claim.
The post has emerged on the back of the recent launch of a Youth Manifesto by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) that announced that their government would absorb tuition fees of level 100 students in public universities.
To verify the claim, Fact-Check Ghana examined budget statements, as the Scholarships Secretariat does not publicly release data on the exact number of scholarship beneficiaries.
Fact-Check Ghana found contradictions between the claim/press statement and available data after reviewing the claim.
Contrary to the claim and press statement, the 2020 budget statement indicated that the Scholarship Secretariat introduced the Local Tertiary Scholarships for the payment of tuition fees (full/part) for 30,000 students in all accredited tertiary institutions, both public and private. (Page 103)
The 2021 budget statement further highlighted that the Secretariat was able to make payments for tuition fees and allowances to scholarship beneficiaries under the various scholarship schemes for the 2019/2020 academic year.
“Mr Speaker, in 2020, a total of 1,748 foreign and 47,141 local scholarships and bursaries were awarded to students”, the budget statement read in part. In total 48,889 beneficiaries were awarded scholarships in 2020.
Moreover, a review of the 2022 budget statement for any reference to the 2019/2020 academic year and 2021/2022 academic years, showed that the Government and the Scholarships Secretariat granted local scholarships to 45,000 tertiary students,1,600 training college students, and foreign scholarships to 560 students in the preceding year.
At no point in any of the budget statements was it mentioned that 60,000 scholarships were awarded in 2020, contradicting the claim made in the post.
Furthermore, data on scholarship beneficiaries available to Fact-Check Ghana shows that 20,988 students, not 60,000 received financial support from the Scholarship Secretariat. The 20,988 beneficiaries comprised students studying in both local and international schools. The data was acquired through a Right to Information (RTI) request sent to the Secretariat in 2021.
In conclusion, while the Scholarship Secretariat issued a statement that suggested there were about 60,000 student beneficiaries, the number is not supported by the government’s budget statements. The said number of beneficiaries is further contradicted by data the Secretariat shared with the team through an RTI request in 2021.
