The Accra High Court has dismissed a case brought against the Ministry of Education and three other defendants over the ‘one teacher, one laptop’ policy.

Two teacher unions – the Innovative Teachers and All Teachers Alliance Ghana (ATAG) – filed suit against the MoE, K.A Technologies and others over the contract to supply the laptops.

The teachers unions were against the contract and took the matter to court – but the suit has been dismissed.

On Thursday, December 23 2021, the presiding judge threw out the case for lack of capacity.

The court dismissed the case on the grounds that the Plaintiffs failed to demonstrate the capacity in which they filed the suit.

Since they are not parties to the contract, the court determined that they do not have ‘locus standi’ to bring suit against the deal.

The court acquiesced to a motion by the defence counsel for the case to be dismissed.

“It is our case that, capacity to sue goes to the jurisdiction of the court and once you have not been able to demonstrate the capacity to the court, the law is clear that, the court has no jurisdiction of the matter,” lawyer of the 1st Defendant (K.A Technologies Ghana Limited) Edward Kwame Oppong, said.

Aside throwing out the case, the judge awarded Ghc 15,000 in costs against the two teachers unions.

Background

The two teacher Trade Unions sued the Government over the awarding of a contract to K.A Technologies to procure laptops for teachers.

The sole-sourced contract is to provide every teacher in Ghana with a laptop.

Under the deal, the government would cover 70% of the cost whilst the teachers would pay the remaining 30% through deductions from their salaries.

Source: GhanaCelebrities.Com