As an African from Ghana, I believe that, our national languages should be encouraged in our schools more than the foreign languages imposed on us.
Most Ghanaian children find it very difficult to learn their native languages at home and i guess that is why educational institutions has been structured to help parents educate their children, but here is the case where our native languages are been forgotten by the same people who we trusted that they will help us.
Our educational system has shoved foreign languages into our throat to the extent that, some parents must communicate with their children in foreign languages at home. When you try to communicate with your child pn our native languages, he/she will tell you that, "Teacher said we shouldn't speak vernacular" and this makes the parents also speak their form four English which ends up confusing both the child and the parent.
I once heard a parent and her son communicating one morning. It took the young boy some time to understand that, his mom actually wanted him to bring a comb just so the mother can use it on him. I asked myself, couldn't it be easier for the mother to communicate in her native language to her child? Then I remembered that, the teachers has influenced this children with the "dont speak vernacular" syndrome.
Can you image the complexity of doing things should we abolish all this foreign languages which are made a must for us to learn and adopt our own languages?
Can you image the kind of exposure and revenue this will generate to our country because other people will like to invest and study our native languages?
Tourist attractions and all that. Image how our GDP will shoot up should we implement this agenda of pushing our Ghanaian languages more in our schools.
Its time for us to wake up as Ghanaians and hold what we have strongly because what we have is unique and beautiful.
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