By KT Reporter
Gulu District local government is yet to review its education ordinance fifteen years after it was implemented.
The 2010 education ordinance was passed by the Council seeking to revitalize the standards of education within the District. The ordinance had punitive measures, including the ban on bars operating near a school whose failure attracts a fine of 40,000 shillings or revoking of a business license of a serial offender.
The ordinance also established a six-month jail sentence for any parent who fails to send a child to school, tasking them further to provide food, clothes, transport and shelter to children.
Government-aided schools were also prohibited from asking for school fees from the learners or soliciting money from them, while any instruction of school inspection is equally punishable by 40,000 shillings.
The Councilor Representing Bungatira Sub County to Gulu District Local Government Balington Ongwec noted that the ordinance has remained in the archive of the Council. He noted that the ordinance had domesticated the Education Act of 2007.
Ongwec, however, blamed the executive for the failure to activate the ordinance, adding that, even at sub-county levels, the implementation of the ordinance has not taken off.
Mathia Mwaa, the Chairperson of the School Management Committee of Cet-Kana Primary School, cited the knowledge gaps in the implementation of the ordinance.
Mwaa noted that the school attempted to rally parents to embrace the ordinance, but the provisions in the ordinance were not adequately interpreted and understood.
“We got some two acres of land and convinced the parents to grow maize and beans, but religious tension destroyed the progress “, Mwaa noted.
Mwaa noted that the school is being claimed by both the Catholic and Anglican Church as a foundation body,” our parents were ready to grow crops in school to feed their children”
Gulu District Senior Education Officer David Obol has noted with concern the negative attitude of parents towards education, which the ordinance could potentially have addressed.
“We have parents who are now withdrawing the children from schools to go and work in the gardens now that rain is coming back, that is the challenge we have”, Obol stated.
Meanwhile, the Vice Chairperson of Gulu District Local Government, Vicky Atim, has revived hope for activating the nearly defunct ordinance for its implementation.
He revealed that the District Executive is currently reviewing the ordinance, which will soon be tabled before the Council for budgetary allocation for supporting the enforcement.
“The ordonnance has financial implications to implement. The Council didn’t prioritize allocating funds, but this can be discussed in our next sitting,” Atim further explained in an interview.
Gulu District has 47 primary government-aided schools with over 45,000 learners, but only 6 schools are partially implementing the school feeding program to learners in upper classes-URN. Give us feedback on this story through our email: kamwokyatimes@gmail.com
