SCHOOLS in Papua New Guinea are still waiting for the Education Department to release the next batch of tuition subsidy funds which, according to secretary Dr Uke Kombra, were supposed to be paid two weeks ago. Dr Kombra said the department was in the process of releasing K30 million to schools for the third batch of tuition subsidy funds, however, schools had yet to receive these funds. There had been reports from schools in Port Moresby, who are struggling to stay open due to a lack of funds, and in Morobe where schools are on the verge of closure because their accounts are running out of money. De La Salle Secondary School principal Br Anthony Pancras said the 2020 school year had so far been a difficult one administratively in light of the Covid-19.
He said they received the second batch of their subsidy payment on July 8 and the outstanding Government subsidy for the school was over K600,000. “We have only two months before the national exams and many schools are facing a lot of challenges to run the school due to insufficient finances,” he said. Gordon Secondary School principal George Kenega said the last payment they received was in April and they had been running the school with support from parents. “With the TFF policy, we (schools) used to receive funds on a monthly basis but since it has been replaced with the government subsidy this year, we have only received two batches of payments, one in January and the second payment in April,” he said. Acting Education secretary for NCD Sam Lora said the Education Department was not able to provide adequately to sustain schools because of the impact the Covid-19 pandemic had on the Government’s resources. Attempts to get comments from Education Minister Joseph Yopyyopy and secretary Dr Uke Kombra on when the next batch of tuition subsidy payments were unsuccessful. The National/PNGEducationNews Next : PNG University Of Natural Resources And Environment Has New Management Comments are closed.
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