By A Concerned Citizen, Marena Parade, Banjul.
A Gambian newspaper columnist recently simply cited the poor results of this year’s Junior Secondary School examinations when he was inundated with critical email messages from the Jammeh sycophants accusing him of being unpatriotic - accusations laced with unwarranted invectives. The columnist’s piece is really the tip of the iceberg of what is now considered by the donor community as a dismal state of the education system in The Gambia.
It is very common for Yahya Jammeh and his supporters to cite the number of schools built since 1994 as a sign of success of his government. It is indeed true that primary level education has been made more accessible to Gambian children during APRC rule. In particular, girls’ enrolment in primary education has significantly increased and it is on track to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The current capital development or ‘brick and mortar’ program has substantially increased the number of schools, in particular the upper basic and senior secondary schools. This trend is undesirable, given the current state of the Gambian economy as a whole and has resulted in recurrent expenditures as a share of total expenditures steadily declining over recent years. When you have persistent increases in capital expenditure, recurrent expenditure suffers under normal circumstances and when recurrent expenditure declines precipitously, quality suffers because it is the recurrent spending that provides the vital inputs such as teachers’ salaries and benefits, schoolbooks, supplies. In short, when provision of teaching and learning materials is in short supply, quality declines. That is what has been happening in Yahya Jammeh’s Gambia. Now let us look as some revealing examination figures, which are the handy work of Jammeh and his APRC government.
The Junior Secondary School Certificate (JSSC) is the only available comparative measurement of teaching outcomes. The 2001 results of the JSSC shown below by subject revealed a disturbing trend of extremely high failure rates shown in brackets: English (62%), Mathematics (84%), Science (62%), Social Studies (40%), Islamic Studies (71%), Agriculture (52%) and Art (21%).
The dismal level of performance by students at Grades nine and twelve examinations together with a high level of drop-out rates are all indications that the Gambian school system is deteriorating at an alarming rate. Unfortunately, the recently unveiled Strategic Plan for the Education sector does not address this fundamental flaw in our education system because the emphasis still remains infrastructural development instead of putting emphasis on the ‘software’ aspect of Gambian education. Unless there is a fundamental rethink of the strategy, the output of the Gambian education system will be of such low quality that it will not be able to compete sub-regionally much more globally. Gambian education should be as much about quality as about quantity.
Contrary to popular belief, education is losing its priority status in Jammeh’s government. It is true that Government expenditures on education grew by 69 % in current prices. However, comparing these expenditure figures with other sectors, a different picture emerges. Budgeted education expenditure has been falling from the late 1990s from a high of 17.1 per cent of government budget in 1999 to less than 10% in 2004. Education expenditure relative to GDP also declined from 4.3% to less than 3%. From these figures, one can only conclude that education has not been the high priority item that the Jammeh government wants us to believe. The dismal exam results of the past decade attest to the fact that government policy of putting higher premium on infrastructural development in the education sector has seriously compromised the quality of education in The Gambia. A recent statement by the Permanent Secretary at the Department responsible for Basic Education confirmed this trend.
To reverse this undesirable trend, immediate remedial action must be taken and it should start with the budget. Unfortunately, all indications are that this year’s budget, as in previous ones, will continue to re-enforce fiscal indiscipline rather than to reverse the trend. Already, external resources will finance budget figures for 2007-show increase in expenditure of over 17% and according to the SOS Finance 64% of next year’s budget. The irresponsible fiscal and monetary policies of the APRC government must cease if the general economic decline and the particular endemic problem facing the education sector are to be effectively addressed.
The Supplementary Appropriation Act of 2007 is further evidence that the education sector is not receiving its fair share of the cake because no supplementary appropriation is being requested from the National Assembly. Instead, the favored sectors are featured and they are Foreign Affairs, Interior and Security. This pattern is consistent with the criticism of the budget by the World Bank and the IMF.