Education

Public secondary schools to receive capitation funds from next week - state

Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang. (Photo: Education Ministry)

By Lucy Mumbi | Monday, March 18, 2024

The government has allocated Sh65 billion for free secondary education capitation, with 25 per cent of this amount set to be released immediately.

The government will disburse capitation funds owed to public secondary schools within the next 10 days, Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang has said.

Kipsang made the announcement while appearing before the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee on Monday.

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He disclosed that the government has allocated Sh65 billion for free secondary education capitation, with 25 per cent of this amount set to be released immediately.

“This morning, I held discussions with my colleague from the National Treasury. We are releasing up to 25 per cent of the outstanding capitation amount owed to secondary schools nationwide.

Our aim is to ensure that by the end of this quarter, we can disburse 50 per cent,” Kipsang said.

“We anticipate that the allocated amount will be deposited into respective accounts within the next 10 days.”

However, he reported that the government has been struggling to finance schools due to high student populations.

According to the PS, as of the end of January 2024, the student population had risen by one million, posing a significant challenge to government funding.

Kipsang noted that meanwhile, the amount allocated for free secondary education—Sh65 billion—has remained the same.

“We need to increase the blocked figure of around Sh65 billion because when it was capped at Sh65 billion, our secondary school student population was at 3.2 million," he said.

"As of January 2024, we had 4.2 million students in our secondary schools, but the amount that's continued to be given is between Sh64 billion and Sh65 billion."

He noted that with the allocation of Sh65 billion, the capitation per student should be Sh22,224.

However, the amount has been revised downward to Sh17,000 to cater for the needs of all students.

“If we were to give Sh22,224 per student, then we would only fund 3.2 million children, meaning that you will not be funding one million students in our schools today,” he said.

The PS urged Parliament to increase the blocked figure to cater for the 4.2 million students in secondary schools.

He confirmed that, together with the House Committee on Education, they are trying to find a way to increase the budgetary allocation.

“I confirm that this year, there was quite some good engagement, and indications were given that we shall find a capitation of Sh22,224 [multiplied by that] number of learners,” he said.

School heads across the country had warned of the early closure of their institutions due to the government's failure to release the capitation funds.

The Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) claimed that operations in public schools had stalled due to a lack of funding and that teachers were struggling to run the institutions.

Kipsang also clarified that the capitation for senior secondary schools was only meant for tuition-related costs, not feeding the learners.

“The media sometimes reports that capitation has not been released, and therefore schools cannot feed children. Feeding children is not part of capitation. Capitation is purely for tuition and tuition-related issues,” he said.

He also warned school heads against increasing fees, saying they will face dire consequences if they continue charging extra levies, as the government funding already takes care of the needs of the schools in terms of tuition.