LIRA– Members of Parliament [MPs] under the umbrella of Lango Parliamentary Group [LPG] have asked government to intervene and make secondary school education affordable to the children of poor parents in the sub-region.
The MPs said much as the government, through the Ministry of Education and Sports, has constructed eight Seed secondary schools in the subregion to increase the accessibility, affordability is still a challenge due to hard economic situations.
“The new seed schools will go a long way in improving secondary education, unfortunately, according to the Uganda National Household Survey Report 2019/2020, secondary school enrollment in Lango is among the lowest,” they said.
The information was contained in the report they presented to President Yoweri during his recent meeting with the leaders in Otuke district.
“It is among the lowest in the country at only 14.5 percent against a national average of 27.3 percent,” Kole Woman MP Judith Alyek, who doubles as Chairperson of LPG, explained.
To emphasise their point, the MPs referred to Kampala district which has 52.3 percent enrollment, and Karamoja which has only 12.1 percent.
Alyek said the major factors for the poor school enrolment of children in Lango include; lack of funding by the government and parents’ incapacitation to afford money to pay for secondary education.
The survey report also shows that the sub-region has the fifth-highest household expenditure on secondary education, standing at Sh1.1 million, with Teso sub-region having the lowest at Shs 494,000.
“We request for heightened and urgent intervention to make secondary education more affordable,” MP Alyek added.
Dokolo Woman MP Cecilia Ogwal, urged the government to set a strategic programme targeting child mothers and girls who dropped out during the Covid-19 lockdown.
According to Communication for Development, a non-governmental organisation that avails information on development issues, a total of 23,000 girls were impregnated in the Lango Sub-region during the lockdown that spanned almost two years.
MP Ogwal urged government to develop a workable plan for this category, saying it could save their future.
https://thecooperator.news/lango-sub-region-mps-demand-reconstruction-of-roads-network/
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