The Head of the Gurune Language Department of the University of Winneba, Mr. Ephraim Avea, has stated that the Gurune Language has been developed with sufficient teaching and learning materials that could be examinable at the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) level without problems.
Mr. Avea was speaking to the Ghana News Agency in reaction to the issue raised by the Upper East Regional Directorate of Education that the Gurune Language did not have enough teaching and learning materials to make it examinable at the BECE level.
He noted that a body known as the Gurune Language Association was set up to develop teaching and learning material for the Language and indicated that a lot of basic publications had been made and were in the system, some of which were currently used by some Gurune teachers in the Upper East Region.
He stated that the Bolgatanga Municipal Assembly and the Bolgatanga, Nangodi, Bongo and Tongo (BONABOTO) Union had committed a lot of resources into the development of the Language.
He explained that the University of Winneba for more than 15 years now had also trained a lot of Gurune teachers who were capable of teaching the Gurune subject effectively without encountering any problems and indicated that currently majority of the subject teachers were performing their duties in the region.
Mr. Avea indicated that since 2002 some training colleges, including the Pusiga and Saint John Bosco's Training Colleges in the Region had also been teaching the Gurune Language and had turned out a lot of the subject teachers, saying, it could not be true that there was a shortage of teachers or learning and teaching materials for the language as some people sought to imply.
He noted that plans were far advanced for the Gurune subject to be made examinable in the year 2010 by WAEC and said a letter to that effect together with manuals of Publication on the subject had already been submitted to the Director-General of Ghana Education Service who had assured them that it would be studied and given the necessary attention.
Meanwhile, when the Regional Director of Education, Mr. Fabian Belieb, met the Ghanaian language teachers to brief them on the subject, he said Gurune was not developed enough with teaching and learning materials and therefore was not examinable and that Dagbani language would be examined in the subsequent BECE sitting in the region.
The teachers, numbering about 300 protested vehemently and said that could not happen and emphasized that the Gurune Language could be examinable at the BECE level since it had teaching and learning materials as well as teachers.
"Let us not forget that language goes with the culture of the people, and therefore Dagbani, spoken in the Tamale area, cannot be imposed on Gurune speaking children in the Upper East Region", they said.
The teachers appealed to the Director General of the Ghana Education Service to expedite action by approving the document submitted to the GES to make the Gurune Subject examinable.
According to the directive from the Regional Directorate of GES, students from Bolgatanga, Bongo, Talensi-Nabdam, Bawku West, Bawku East and Garu-Tempane would be made to write Dagbani as an examinable subject at the BECE level whereas Builsa, Kassena-Nankana East and Kasena-Nankana West write the Kassim Language.
Meanwhile, for the past years the Bolgatanga, Bongo, Talensi-Nabdam, Bawku West and Bawku East and Garu-Tempane in the Region had not been writing Ghanaian Language as a subject at the BECE except Kassena-Nankana West, East and Builsa that write Kassim language.
The Regional Director later told the language teachers that he would forward their concerns to the appropriate quarters for redress.