THE Tanzania Association of Managers and Owners of Non- Government Schools and Colleges (TAMONGSCO) has cried foul of the government’s austerity measures and its free education policy, saying they have plunged new enrollment in private schools into the lowest ever level this year that may see some schools quitting the field.
“Private schools may gradually vanish if the government doesn’t change its policies,” Tamongsco Secretary General Benjamin Nkonya told The Guardian on Sunday over the weekend in reference to the situation that depicted the number of entrants to both kindergartens and Standard One in private schools to have dropped by 25 per cent as the academic year started earlier in the week.
He said in good old days 15 per cent out of about 7 million kids across the nation would be enrolled in private schools annually. Given the traditional number to be slightly over 1.1 million, only about 700,000 kids might have been registered this year, according to him.
“I may not have the exact number for each school but the general trend shows that some schools may be forced into closure as they can hardly make their ends meet due to tremendous drop in the new enrollment,” he said.
He attributed poverty of the would-be investors in education to what he believed was inability of the equally impoverished parents and guardians to pay fees for their children.
“They can no longer afford paying fees for their children as just like everyone else they have become victims of the government’s austerity measures, I think,” he said, adding that the situation has been also exacerbated by the government’s imposition of free education in rival public schools.
However, Nkonya suggested a way out of the mess, calling for the government into the negotiating table with the private education investors to work out a joint system to serve both sides that share a common course.
He suggested the government to take advantage of the private school owners’ enthusiastic call to provide them with teachers, pay them salaries and send capitation grants for the private schools to enroll pupils who had otherwise failed to get places in public schools.
“Education should be made a national priority investment needing an inter-sectoral approach to improve, and as a rule, public-private partnership is a necessary requisite,” he said.
“It is obvious that the government could not improve the education sector single-handedly, that’s why involvement of community stakeholders in the form of public-private partnerships was necessary,” he said
He said if the government would provide private schools owners with favourable environment to run their institutions, it would be a great service to the country that is determined to produce competent professionals.
“We ask the government to work with us for the sake of our children who are the future of our nation, believing that it acknowledges our contribution in the provision of quality education,” he said.
“Economic hardship has hit us hard in such a way that some of us are considering about closing our schools… Can you imagine a situation where parents can no longer afford pocket money for their kids in schools?” lamented a school owner who preferred anonymity.
“There are those Tanzanians who had been benefitting from the previous loose system. Some of them can no longer foot education costs for their children in private schools now that there are no more loopholes. They have now taken back their children to public schools they had once forsaken,” said a teacher of a public school who also preferred anonymity.
But echoing Nkonya, Bishop Isack Irigo, owner of Mseru and Goldenrule schools located in Kigamboni district in Dar es Saalaam said parents and guardians had been flocking premises of his schools with requests to have their kids enrolled in advance with promises to pay fees latter because they could not afford timely payments.
“The situation depicts the real picture of their economic state-of-affair,” he said.
But the man of God rebuked Tanzanians over their habit to lay the blames about their worsening economic situation on the President, saying they should instead turn to God in prayers for changes.
“From what I know, it is only God who is capable of changing the situation; so let it be the way it is if what is happening in the country has the blessing of God. He is the very one who made Magufuli the leader of our country,” he said.
President John Magufuli endorsed a barrage of austerity measures immediately as he was sworn in the office in November 2015, imposing radical tax collection scheme, iron-handed manner of dealing with corruption, extremely mean cost cutting scheme and an iron-fist method of maintaining discipline, order and sense of responsibility in public offices.
But one of his immediate policies that won him popularity was his introduction of 10 years of compulsory free education, a move that was apparently frowned at by the private school owners who had been allegedly making fortunes out of the education
Ugandan socialite Zari is undeniably hot and Diamond Platnumz cannot be blamed for going kookoo for her, Besides her looks, she is also ambitious and rich. Born on 23rd of September 1980, Zari grew up in Jinja and after high school she moved Kampala where she performed karaoke in hang-outs. She later moved to London and acquired a diploma in cosmetology. She now lives in South Africa where she runs cosmetics shop while pursuing a career in music. She shared some of her never before seen photos from back in the day and she was still hot. Check her out
Post a Comment