GHANA LEBNON SECONDARY SCHOOL AT TEN

 Story: Zainabu Issah



THE Ghana Lebanon Islamic Secondary School (GLISS), held its 10th anniversary and first Speech and Prize-Giving Day in Accra with a call on wealthy muslims and muslim non-governmental organisations to establish more Islamic institutions of higher learning.
The Vice President, Mr. John Dramani Mahama, who made the call in a speech read on his behalf by the Deputy Majority Leader in Parliament, Mr. Rashid Pelpuo, said the successes chalked by recently established institutions of higher learning made that move imperative.
Present at the ceremony were the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni, former Vice President, Alhaji Aliu Mahama and the National Chief Imam, Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharabutu.
GLISS was established in September 2000 by the Ghana Society for Islamic Education and Reformation (GSIER), and commissioned in May 2001 by Alhaji Aliu Mahama.
With an initial student population of 50 and only one school block the school now has more than 700 students with a huge complex made up of a Senior High School, and a Junior High and Primary schools.
Mr Mahama expressed gratitude to the GSIER for its dedicated service to Ghanaians in the education sector and in other equally important sectors of the economy.
He urged the patrons, management and staff of the school to put the school on a higher pedestal, adding that that would contribute towards building a formidable human resource base for the nation.
 Alhaji Mahama in a speech said he was happy to be alive to see the achievements and successes of the school since he last commissioned it ten years ago.
He said he was humbled by moral and academic discipline among the students
He appealed to the security agencies, the media and the educational institutions to continue to preach the concept of discipline.
Furthermore, he appealed to Muslims to see education as a tool with which to fight poverty and use all the resources  at their disposal to educate their children and to see them become prominent members in society.
That, he said, would help them to move away from crime and prostitution which, he added, had become the bane in the Muslim community.
Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni, who chaired the function, said GLISS was a testimony of the co-operation between Ghana and Lebanon and greater opportunities to come.
He encouraged the staff  and students to seek knowledge since it is the key to fight poverty.
The Chairman, of the Parents Teacher Association (PTA), Mr Suraj Boadi, said the association had successfully fought for the reintroduction of the Arabic Language to be examinable by the West African Examinations Centre (WAEC).
 He appealed to the government to provide the school with a bus.
The Deputy Director of the School, Alhaji Mohammed Baba Alhassan, who is the deputy director of the school, was later awarded with a laptop for his long service and loyalty to the school.

Published in Daily Graphic