• He said free primary education has been allocated Sh12.5 billion, Sh65.4 billion will go to free day secondary education which is inclusive of insurance and NHIF cover.
• Sh1 billion has been proposed for the promotion of teachers, school feeding programme has been allocated Sh4.9 billion while Sh940 million will go towards provision of sanitary towels.
Image: EZEKIEL AMING'A
President William Ruto has emulated his predecessor Uhuru Kenyatta and allocated the Ministry of Education the lion’s share of his Sh3.68 trillion maiden budget for 2023-24 financial year.
In budget estimates read in Parliament on Thursday by Treasury CS Njuguna Ndungu, the ministry was allocated Sh628.6 billion, equivalent to 27.4 per cent of the entire budget.
This is a Sh84.2 billion increase from the Sh544.4 billion Uhuru allocated the docket in his Sh3.31 trillion budget for the 2022-23 financial year.
Ndungu said the ministry received the amount to match the rising needs occasioned by the competency-based curriculum and the need to provide accessible and quality education to all Kenyans.
He said free primary education has been allocated Sh12.5 billion, and Sh65.4 billion will go to free day secondary education which is inclusive of insurance and NHIF cover.
Junior Secondary School has been allocated a capitation of Sh25.5 billion, Sh5 billion will cater for national exams waiver while the Teachers Service Commission has been allocated Sh4.8 billion for the recruitment of 20,000 inter-teachers.
Ndungu said a further Sh1 billion has been proposed for the promotion of teachers, the school feeding programme has been allocated Sh4.9 billion while Sh940 million will go towards the provision of sanitary towels.
“In addition Mr Speaker, I propose to the National Assembly to effect the budget allocation of Sh1.3 billion for the training of teachers on Competency-Based Curriculum and Sh400 milliom for digital literacy programme and ICT integration in our secondary schools,” the CS said.
Primary and secondary school infrastructure development has been allocated Sh6 billion which will also cater for the construction of classrooms for Junior secondary schools.
The CS further proposed an allocation of Sh1.9 billion for the construction and equipment of Technical training institutions and vocational training centres.
He said a further Sh1.8 billion will be allocated to improve access and improve training in vocational training institutions.
TSC has been allocated a further Sh316.7 billion, university education has been given Sh97.5 billion, Sh30.4 billion for Higher Education Loans Board, Sh2.7 billion for secondary education quality improvement project, and Sh5.2 billion as capitation for TVET students.
In last year’s budget, Sh4 billion was allocated for the construction of classrooms in readiness for the first cohort of Junior secondary school learners.
In the budget read by Ndungu’s predecessor Ukur Yatani, the government allocated a further Sh2.8 billion to support school infrastructure development in public primary and secondary schools.
The digital literacy programme got Sh310 million in Uhuru’s last budget, TSC was allocated Sh2.5 billion to recruit more teachers while Sh1.2 billion went into their training on the Competency-Based Curriculum.
Further, TSC was allocated Sh294.7 billion, half of which went into teacher remuneration.
The Kenya Secondary School Education Quality Improvement project was allocated Sh6.8 billion while Sh971 million went into promotion of youth employment.