TEACHERS ASKED TO MOTIVATE THE ACADEMICALLY WEAK (PAGE 31)

THE new Executive Secretary of the National Identification Authority, (NIA) Professor Ken Agyemang Attafuah, has advised teachers at all levels to adequately motivate pupils and students perceived to be weak academically to enable them to unearth and develop their potential effectively.
This, he said, would enable them to acquire the requisite skills that would make it possible for them to contribute more meaningfully to accelerate socio-economic development.
He pointed out that students who excelled in life as a result of the motivations they received from their teachers, did not only acknowledge those contributions and reward them adequately, but also grow to become national assets who enhance sustainable development.
Addressing a cross section of the public in Kumasi during the launch of his book, Fighting Armed Robbery in Ghana, at the weekend, Professor Attafuah said in an attempt to correct their pupils and students considered to be deviants and weak, some teachers resorted to the use of vulgar language and corporal punishment, thereby intimidating the students and discouraging them from unearthing their talents at their tender age.
Such negative attitudes, he noted, contributed to making students frustrated in school, leading to the large dropouts at all levels of the educational ladder.
School dropouts, he said, eventually found solace in indulging in criminal activities such as prostitution, drug peddling and stealing, while others became pick pockets and armed robbers.
Fighting armed robbery in Ghana traces the trends of crime over a 10-year period, and dwells on its characteristics as well as implications of armed robbery, common sites of armed robbery in the country, target selection and rules of engagement in the crime.
It also concentrates on deadly encounters and rape-related cases of victims of the crime, how the criminals enjoy their gains and attempt to avoid any trouble, factors affecting the probability of arrest, societal responses to armed robbery in the country, factors that inspire the criminal to quit armed robbery, and the capacity of the police in combating the criminals to enhance peace in the country.
Professor Attafuah, who served as the Executive Secretary of the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) and former Chief Investigator and Director of Operations at the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), said irresponsible parenthood contributed immensely to turn otherwise sober children into deviants in society as they grew up.
“When they experienced a gap between their legitimate expectations of success and real achievements, they adopted deviant means to achieve their conventional goals; they chose the criminal path, because it assured wealth quickly without the usual aggravations inherent in the patient pursuit of legitimate, long-term investment,” he stressed.
He said the police recorded over a 10-year period, between 1997 and 2006, a total of 7,471 cases of armed robbery in the country.
He said inadequate motivation to the police by the state to enable them to be committed to combat armed robbery effectively and efficiently, a lack of logistics such as bicycles, motors bikes, armoured vehicles, bullet proof vests and fast-moving vehicles, among others, also make it difficult for the police to face armed robbers head-on to bring the situation under total control.