UN Children agency or UNICEF is calling on authorities of South Sudan to increase its public spending in education as it is not sufficiently prioritizing children’s education.
While the internationally agreed international standard for education allocations is 20 percent of the national budget, South Sudan only spends 5.6 percent for 2019-2020, according the national budget.
UNICEF said ‘this is the lowest public education spending in East Africa, recent studies say.
‘Education must be a top priority for the Government in South Sudan and sufficient allocations must be made to ensure every child in the country can go to school and learn,’ said UNICEF Representative in South Sudan Dr Mohamed Ag Ayoya.
He added that ‘by investing in the education of its children, South Sudan is investing in the future and development of the whole country’.
‘With South Sudan’s academic year commencing in a few weeks, it is prudent to commit to realizing every child’s right to an education, by ensuring the education sector has the necessary resources’, said Ayoya.
The call for more public spending on education in South Sudan comes as UNICEF is launching the global report – ‘addressing the learning crisis: an urgent need to better finance education for the poorest children’.
In South Sudan, lack of public investment in education is contributing to the critical shortage of qualified teachers.
It said estimated 62 percent of primary teachers and 44 percent of secondary teachers are not qualified and many left due to irregular salaries payment.
UNICEF calls the Government of South Sudan to progressively increase the education share of the national budget to the international agreed standard of 20 per cent and ensure salaries of qualified teachers are paid and paid on time to increase teacher retention.
The government has to allocate adequate resources to pre-primary education to ensure children are starting primary school well prepared.