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Kenya: Free Education? Not Really, Says PS
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The Nation (Nairobi)
16 October 2007
Posted to the web 15 October 2007
Peter Ngare
Nairobi
Secondary education will not be totally free come January next year, the Government has clarified.
Education permanent secretary Karega Mutahi said yesterday that only the tuition fee has been waived and the responsibility of meeting the other costs still rested with parents and guardians.
Speaking at a regional workshop on education at Silver Springs Hotel, Nairobi, yesterday, the PS said the Government will meet the cost of tuition at a flat rate of Sh3,600 per student in public schools.
"We have already set aside Sh2.9 billion for first and second term tuition for all students next year. We are doing everything possible to make education affordable," said the PS in a speech read on his behalf by a senior deputy secretary in the ministry, Mr Michael Ojiambo.
Current regime
The announcement now clears the air following conflicting signals on whether the current regime will meet the full cost of learning or just a part of it, if it is retained by voters in December polls.
Since he launched his re-election campaigns on August 30, President Kibaki has said secondary education will be free come January.
The pronouncements have left parents wondering on the correct Government position with Education ministry officials refusing to comment for fear of contradicting the Head of State.
Other presidential hopefuls have pledged free secondary education. ODM flag-bearer Raila Odinga has promised free secondary schooling while ODM-Kenya's Kalonzo Musyoka said on Sunday that his administration would fully finance education for children from poor backgrounds from nursery to secondary.
A recent study by Kenya Institute for Public Policy and Research Analysis on the feasibility of free secondary education, however, cast doubts on such an undertaking next year.
The study revealed that it would cost over Sh45 billion next year to finance free schooling and the cost will shoot up to Sh75 billion by 2011. The higher costs will arise from hiring of more teachers, buying learning materials and putting up facilities to accommodate more students who would join the schools.
At the same time, the forum was told that the quality of free primary education has been compromised by teacher shortage and limited facilities.
Unqualified teachers are being hired by parents to address shortfalls while most classrooms are overcrowded.
Speakers at the workshop blamed the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank saying their macro-economic conditionalities had impeded Government's efforts to hire professional teachers and invest in school infrastructure.
"Due to lack of funds, the Government has frozen teacher employment while classrooms are congested. To address shortage, parents are hiring untrained teachers," said Mr David Archer, the head of education at Actionaid International.
Cheap labour
He said the Bretton Woods institutions considered education as a consuming component of the economy and were therefore recommending hiring of cheap labour.
Prof Mutahi had said the pupil to teacher ratio stood at between 50:1 and 100:1 in most schools.
The situation, said Mr Archer, was worrying as little or no learning could take place is such an environment.
He said the ideal ratio was between 30:1. He however said Kenya should at least strive to achieve a 40:1 ratio for quality education to be realised.
He called on the Government to ignore economic conditions that adversely affected education saying the sector was the key to growth and progress.
Kenya National Union of Teachers secretary general Francis Ng'ang'a said the IMF had recommended hiring of teachers on contract instead of having them employed on permanent basis.
He said this was not acceptable as it would lead to further deterioration of the quality of education.
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The head of Actionaid Kenya Joyce Umbima said it was unacceptable for the Government to encourage hiring of untrained teachers while thousands of professionally qualified teachers are jobless.
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