Private schools ask govt to pay teachers’ salaries for one year
President Museveni addresses teachers during a meeting in Kampala last year. PHOTO | FILE
What you need to know:
- Govt directive. Last month, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education and Sports, Mr Alex Kakooza, directed in a circular that private schools must continue paying their teachers despite the extended closure over the Covid-19 pandemic.
The National Private Education Institutions Association (NPEIA) wants government to pay salaries for teachers in private schools for at least a year if there are no plans to reopen the learning institutions.
NPEIA leaders, while appearing before Parliament’s Committee on National Economy yesterday, revealed that they are not able to pay the teachers when there is no income in terms of school fees.
“We pray that the government considers paying salaries for private school teachers for at least one year,” Mr Hasadu Kirabira, the officer-in-charge of national research at NPEIA, said.
The team told the committee chaired by Ms Syda Bbumba (Nakaseke North, NRM) that private schools across the country employ 360,000 teachers who earn a salary totalling to about Shs90b a year with an average monthly net pay of Shs400,000 per teacher.
While asking government to consider reopening schools for the second term to run between August to October and third term through November to January, the private school owners also asked Parliament to create a fund through which they will access low interest loans to be able to recover from the negative impact of the pandemic.
“Parliament needs to enact a law providing for an education recovery fund to capitalise schools to enable them easily meet their financial obligations, purchase the school operational inputs and save thousands of employees from being terminated due to insufficient liquidity,” Mr Kirabira noted.
Other proposals made to the government are to provide or subsidise on personal protective gear such as temperature guns, masks, sanitisers to all schools; negotiating with utility service providers for subsidy on water and electricity; engaging banks to offer low-interest education loans; waiving direct taxes; and, also developing a clear landlord and tenant policy.
Mr Kirabira told the MPs that NPEIA has worked with schools across the country to come up with Covid-19 task forces at school, zonal, sub-county and district level to liaise with the district task forces on how to ensure all the measures put forward by the Ministry of Health are observed in case schools re-open.
The secretary to NPEIA, Mr Alex John Sseruwa, said much as government is encouraging e-learning, they see a challenge because “parents are not prepared to help the child at home” while learning from those platforms.
However, MPs challenged the private schools to ensure they learn from the effects of the pandemic to ensure they are operating in their permanent premises instead of renting, which makes it difficult to find enough space that will be needed for social distancing when they re-open.
The MPs also asked the NPEIA leadership to intensify engagements with the Ministry of Education and Sports to have most of their demands and requests catered for since they have been contributing a lot to the growth of the sector.
Ms Bbumba asked the private schools to take advantage of the e-learning system that has been used during the lockdown so that they are able to persevere with the changes the pandemic is causing to the education system in the country.
