Malawi achieves double Declarations budget allocation targets

By ALBERT SHARRA

With only five years to the Abuja and Darker Declarations goals target the just passed 2010/2011 Malawi national budget has everything that it takes for a nation like Malawi to start celebrating the hope of achieving some of the Millennium Development Goals(MDGs) before 2015.
Malawi is among many countries that singed the Millennium Declarations which aims at achieving the eight MDGs by 2015.However the future of this lies in the hands of regular budget process and long term development strategies.
To achieve this easily head of states from various nations in 2001 assembled in Abuja where they discussed methods that can help nations afford to achieve the goals and they made commitments to ensure they all live to them.
Malawi was one of the participating countries who since the signings have been failing to live to these declarations. Malawi only reached the estimated target once, few months after the signing in its 2002/2003 national budget.
This however became a challenge and strengthened the hope that Malawi will be among the nations that will not achieve these MDGs by 2015.
Among the notable declarations Malawi signed, is the Abuja Declaration on health. At the April 2001 African Union Abuja declaration, nations agreed to allocate at least 15% of the national budgets to the health sector. But since then Malawi has been failing to reach the target in its budgets.
This declaration strives at ensuring that nations are able to provide better health services to its citizens so that they can be able to contribute largely on development activities that will yield in achieving other goals stipulated in the declaration.
According to article 16 of the African Chapter on Human and People Rights and article 12 of the International Convention on Economic Social and Cultural Rights, ignoring issues to do with human health is an infringement on the right to health of African citizens.
Government’s failure to live up to these commitments for the past decade has been a concern. Health and education which are the major priorities have been receiving little funding.
Bringing to rest the hopes and wonder whether government is concerned with its failure to live by these declaration commitments government directed the withdrawal of CHAM and Health Sciences students’ government sponsorship.
It was not a surprise to see many successful students failing to join the colleges during the 2009/2010 CHAM and Health sciences intakes.
Having insufficient space in the University of Malawi students relied on health colleges and the direction was a big blow to many students.
Moses Chikuyu of traditional Authority Msakambewa in Dowa nearly lost his life after he had taken some poison.
Moses who suffered the fate of quota system was not on the list of the university selection despite passing well his Malawi School Certificate of Education and it was a relief to be enrolled at one of the CHAM colleges but the withdraw of the sponsorship was a big blow to his family that had been struggling to source k5 000 for his secondary education.
“My family is poor and they can not even afford to raise quarter of the fees and so the direction was a big blow to my career,” he said.
The resulted reduced enrolment piled concern on the nation which has a huge deficit of trained health personal despite that health training was sponsored.
Deputy Director in Midwives office in the ministry of health Dr Adressa Malata in her speech during the recent opening ceremony of this year’s International Day of Midwives conference in Blantyre said the country needs more health personnel because the increased population and HIV/AIDS have exerted high pressure on medical personnel.
“We are meeting a lot of problems in the hospitals because of the few health personnel we have and there is a need for government to recruit many to help withstand the pressure in the hospitals,” she said.
Principal secretary in the ministry of health Chris Kangombe concurred with Malata saying the situation is bad in the health sector to an extent that over 800 per 100 000 expectant mothers are dying every year due to lack of adequate well-trained and dedicated personnel.
This means if Malawi wants to achieve MDGs 4, 5 and 6 it should do something immediately to increase the annual output of health personnel.
However this can be achieved by increasing the health funding in the national budget as stipulated in the Abuja declaration.
Having done a lot by improving heath infrastructures and delivery of health service care timely the future deemed abrupt with the low funding the ministry has been getting and the intercepted education sponsorship.
However, the situation now smells an extinction hope with the 15.5 percent the government has allocated to the health sector.
The lion’s share of k45 billion the health sector has got has not given a deaf ear to the training of health personnel issue.
Government has spared k395 million for training of health personnel which will see over 1,200 medical students getting scholarships to study at CHAM and health sciences colleges under loan scheme.
The 15.5 percent the government has allocated to the sector shows that government is making strides in its commitment to the Abuja Declarations which stipulates that every government should allocate atleast 15 percent of its total budget to the health sector.
The 2006 report from partners, participants and organizations dedicated to Public Health Development and Financing in Africa says they are concerned with the slow progress and non adherence of nations to the Abuja commitments which has resulted in the unacceptable and unsustainable loss of over 8 million lives a year to preventable, treatable and manageable diseases and health conditions and the continued devastating economic and social cost of not implementing African health commitments and the MDGs.
Coordinator of the 15 percent health allocation Campaign Rotimi Sankore during one of the health summit said the loss of over 8 million African Lives Annually to Preventable, Treatable or Manageable Health Conditions is Equal to 43 Transatlantic Jets with 500 Passengers Each Crashing Every Single Day.
This means ignoring the Abuja declaration is a deliberate need to cost the lives of citizens whose life could have been saved.
To show its eagerness to abide by the international and national agreements, government has also reached the education national budget allocation standard target.
A total of K46.8 billion has been allocated to the ministry representing 20 percent of the total budget. The education fund has seen more allocations placed in the support of primary education a move that will see government achieving MDG 2 which strives to achieve Universal primary education.
In its quest the ministry will recruit more teachers, reduce primary school teacher pupil ration, provide sufficient learning materials and learning and infrastructures.
Civil Society Coalition for Quality Basic Education (CSCQBE) general recommendation report says there is a great need to ensure that allocations to the education sector are guided by the regional and international standards to ensure that the sector does not operate below minimum requirements of 20 percent for realization of Education For All (EFA) goals.
The EFA goals aims at providing free and compulsory education for all, improving quality of education and expanding early childhood care and education.
Malawi was part of the team that signed the 2000 Darker declarations to achieve the EFA goals and at the summit nations agreed to allocate 20 percent of their national budgets to the education sector.
Health and education are the priorities in the regional and international declarations and achieving the allocations shows government commitment to declarations.
Minister of finance Ken Kandodo in an interview on Monday said government is committed to live by these declarations.
“Our 2010/2011 budget has seen allocations such as health exceeding the 15 percent budget allocation nations agreed and this shows how committed we are to these declarations as they are tools to achieving the Millennium development goals ,” he said.
Kandodo also said government is not only committed to achieving these declarations but also to ensure there is quality education and proper health services in the country.
The fiancé minister has also held people who contributed their ideas during the budget consultations saying their contributions have helped in budget modification which among other things have helped it reach standard budget allocations to health and education sectors.
The Abuja declaration demand that every nation should allocate at least 15 percent of the total budget to the health sector while its sister education is entitled to at least 20 percent of the total budget according to the 2000 Darker declaration on education.
END.




EDUCATION

Teaching profession, a night mare

BY ALBERT SHARRA

It is obvious that most employed people live happy life because they are able to feed, and clothe themselves and live in descent houses. It is also this employment that gives many people their different identities in society yields better reputation to many.

With the scarcity of jobs in Malawi, employed people are regarded blessed and they enjoy special respect in the communities they live in.Among these people teachers receive the highest respect. Everywhere you may go in the world you will find out that teachers are identified fast and are regarded most important figures in the society.
.

But Contrary to this perception, these teachers are the worst professionals who are suffering in all aspects of their profession in Malawi.

Imagine yourself working under government for a period of 25 years as a teacher and get promoted only once.

This is why it not a surprise to see many government teacher`s flocking for greener pastures in private schools and while others opt for part time teaching.

One of such teachers who without their sense of patriotism to the professional would have already call it quits, is Epiphania Kakhwiya of St Jones primary school in Lilongwe.

Kakhwiya joined teaching professional in 1984 as a PT4 teacher but was only promoted once to PT3 a decade ago but her salary has never changed.

Everyone almost shed a tear when Kakhwiya revealed her monthly earnings as a P3 teacher.

Kakhwiya told a gathering that assembled at Kamuzu Institute for Sports in Lilongwe in the presence of the minister of Education Dr. George Chaponda during the launch of this year’s CSCQBE global campaign for quality education that her salary can not serve her home for two weeks.

“If I can show you my pay slip, you will be shocked, It is like that of a housemaid but I handle over 150 students everyday,” she said.

Kakhwiya said the road she has walked during the past 28 years she has been in the profession has been rough.

“I don’t think the government appreciates the work teachers do because at our school we have over 2000 students with less than twenty teachers and most of us operate from outside the school, because there are no enough houses. This leads to teachers failing to contribute effectively because they reach the school while tired,” she said.

A spot-check with a number of head teachers in most schools in Lilongwe urban zone has shown that the issue of housing is in almost all schools and that most long serving teachers still get little salaries with no promotion.

At St Jones primary school six teachers have served at the same post for over ten years but have had never had their salaries increased. They too live outside the school campus.

Unfortunately, this school is located close to town where living standards have grown at a fast rate in the past ten years.

“We used to pay less that a thousand kwacha for rent in the past and water and electric bills were minimal but today it is different and so how can you survive on the same earning?” said Kakhwiya.

Civil Society Coalition Quality Basic Education national Coordinator Benedicto Kondowe said the situation is bad for almost 90 percent of teachers in the country.

Kondowe added that the ministry of education is facing a lot of shortfalls due to government‘s failure to provide adequate funding to the sector.


“Malawi is among the 182 countries that signed the Darker declaration in 2000 to come up with serious measures to improve education in the country but it is sad that the government still allocates little funds to the ministry of education,” said Kondowe.

For the past decade the ministry of education has failed to get the international education funding target of 20 percent of the national budget.The biggest funding the ministry got was in the 2007/2008 financial year when it got 14.1 percent of the budget.

However over 50 percent of this education fund is spent in non-salaries activities thereby constraining some important sectors such as salaries review for teachers.

Minister of education Dr. Goerge Chaponda concurred with Kondowe that government is failing to provide quality basic education in the country and that teaching profession remains undesirable to most teachers because of poor funding the ministry gets.

“It is fact that the quality of education in the country is poor and that our teachers are facing a lot of problems in their profession,” he said.

But Chaponda said there are a number of challenges that need to be addressed to achieve quality education in the country.

He said government making strides in developing ways that will solve these challenges.

“We have put in place a number of strategies that will help the ministry of education to have enough funding. We have received some donor funds and the parliament recently permitted government to access more funds of whose biggest share will go to ministries of education and health,” said Chaponda.

Malawi is among the countries striving to achieve the 2015 Education For All (EFA) goals.

Among the notable goals are expansion of early childhood care and education, improving quality education, increasing adult literacy and provision of learning and life skills for youth and adults.

Director of finance and administration in the ministry of finance Ben Botolo who also attended this year lunch of the global campaign for quality education said government of Malawi still stands a mile to achieve provision of better quality education and improve the welfare of its employees in the country.

“It is a dream and a hope that all Malawians wish to achieve, but the current situation with our economy cannot achieve this in a short time. Our exports are not giving back enough and the donor aids are just too little to address all problems Malawi is facing,” said Botolo.

According to CSCQBE statistics on education, Malawi has over 500 000 children who live on the streets and 12 percent of children enrolled in school drop out of school every year.

Minister for Youth Development and Sports Dr Lucious Kanyumba said education is the key to any development in any country and so need good funding.
He said his ministry is aware that many children have no access to education and that many teachers are suffering.

“We are aware of the situation with our teachers in the country and something need to be done immediately,”he said.

END.