The government announced that it will withhold Ksh5.3 billion meant for free day secondary education.
Reports indicated that the funds were meant to pay for student medical cover and textbooks.
In the free day, secondary education project each student was going to receive Ksh4,346 but the ministry announced that each student’s allocation of Ksh1,123 will be directed towards textbooks and Sh900 towards medical cover.
According to the Ministry of Education, the reduction resulted from the decision to change the textbook distribution policy and medical cover.
[caption caption="Students sitting for an exam"]
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School fee guidelines indicate that the government provides Ksh1,999 for medical and insurance annually but the project is lagging behind since it was expected to start in January.
Ministry director-general Elias Abdi stated that the government was in its final stages of fine-tuning the student medical cover guide since it will directly pay NHIF for the medical cover.
“We hope in two months the medical cover scheme will have started. The distribution of textbooks is on course and we have already launched the second phase,” Abdi remarked.
Meanwhile, 1.7 million secondary school students have been covered under the Ksh4 billion medical cover across the country.
NHIF chief executive officer Geoffrey Mwangi earlier on stated that they were still getting data from the Education ministry to ensure all students are covered.
President Uhuru Kenyatta launched the scheme on April 13, and it will run until December 31 and thereafter, it will be renewable annually as from January 1, 2019, for five years.
[caption caption="NHIF chief executive officer Geoffrey Mwangi"]
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It is estimated that three million secondary school students will benefit and the cover will help improve the quality of education in the nation.
