The 81 Member Organizations of the Zambia National Educational Coalition (ZANEC) has expressed their disappointment over the continued neglect of the education sector by the government.
In a statement made available to ZANIS, ZANEC Executive Director George Hamusunga said the neglect by government has been demonstrated by the Ministers of Finance since 2016 by continuously reducing the budgetary allocation to the education and skills sector.
Mr. Hamusungu stated that the last four Ministers of Finance have collectively reduced the share of the education budget from 20.2% in 2015 to the recently announced 11.5% for 2021, representing a 46.3% reduction in the last five years.
He added that the Coalition observes that the K13.8 billion allocation is lower than last year’s budget when one considers the sharp rise in the inflation rate in the last year.
The Director further added that by neglecting education, the four Ministers of Finance have championed the deteriorating education standards in the education system.
Mr Hamusungu noted that in light of the COVID-19 pandemic which resulted in the long closure of schools, it was the Coalition’s expectation that the budget would plan to address the repercussions of the closure.
“The failure for the 2021 Education and Skills Sector budget to allocate enough resources to remediate the loss of learning during the COVID 19 period demonstrates the government’s lack of political will to mitigate the looming education quality crisis,” he said.
“ZANEC further hopes that government will prioritize the disbursement of the K2.3 billion allocated to social cash transfer to vulnerable households with learners who have difficulties to pay school fees to mitigate the impact of COVID-19,” he said.
He said the Coalition has observed that the current budget highlights missed the opportunity for transforming the education system which is currently experiencing a quality crisis.
He explained that the budget has failed to provide the required financing for the education and skills sector to achieve most of the targets provided for in the 7th National Development Plan, vision 2030 and the Education and Skills Sector Plan.
Mwalaumfwa ati ni ba UPND.
There is simply no money. Its not that there is less allocation, You ZANEC, are you the only people who don’t know the country is broke. The PF government made the country broke with reckless borrowing
Reckless borrowing on its own isn’t destructive but reckless borrowing coupled with pocketing the borrowed finances is what has destroyed us
You can’t please everyone especially so during the after effects of a global pandemic. I expected more from zanec as they are meant to be educated and realise the current global economic situation. Alas there is no thinking on their part
For grant-aided institutions such as UNZA, CBU, hospitals etc they ought to brace themselves for even more irregular funding. 2021 will be a bitch of a year. Just to pay some bills, government will raid its sitting duck NAPSA and pretend to borrow workers’ contributions. For young people trying to start a career in such an environment, I really feel sorry 4 them. But Zambians are learning no lessons sadly. They still follow cheap populists and no questions are being asked hw got into the current mess.
They are simply broke these chaps. They had a finance minister who went on a borrowing spree with the supervisor seemingly dead asleep. They are stuck now. Even the road expansion you are seeing in Lusaka, it is the grant from India and paid direct to contractors, government out of the picture with of course a ka weak contribution from the Zambian government