The Government, through spokesperson Isaac Mwaura, announced that Ksh14 billion more capitation funds were released for disbursement following an uproar among school principals over delays.
In a statement on Thursday, Mwaura stated that the money released on Wednesday, January 29, would be disbursed today (Thursday, January 30) to school accounts and hit schools' bank accounts by Friday.
"The National Treasury on Wednesday released Ksh14 billion more towards the school capitation and will be disbursed by today to school accounts. KCB account holders will access it today and the rest by tomorrow," part of the statement read.
In addition to this disbursement, he stated that Ksh19 billion was released last week bringing the total amount sent to schools so far to Ksh33 billion.
Mwaura further promised that the remaining Ksh15 billion would be available to headteachers and principals of Primary, Junior Schools, and Senior Secondary Schools in due time.
"We assure headteachers and principals that the balance of Ksh15 billion is still outstanding for this term and will be released in due course," he added.
This announcement comes barely days after principals from the Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education Teachers (KUPPET) expressed concerns about the late disbursement of this term's funding.
Speaking to the media on Tuesday, KUPPET Nakuru Chapter Chairperson Simon Waita relayed that the National Treasury had failed to meet its deadline of January 14 and still owed Ksh28 billion in unreleased funding.
In addition to this term's Ksh28 billion in arrears, he stated that the government owed at least Ksh7,000 for each student in day schools from the last term.
"The government has not sent any money and the sad state of affairs is that they remained with a balance of about Ksh7,000 per child from last year," Waita stated.
This massive underfunding had reportedly led to the principals having to dig into their own pockets or redirect funding made by parents to other school projects.
In more severe cases, he stated that principals had been forced to fire support staff and some were even facing lawsuits as vendors had gone without pay for long.
