Education receives Ksh544.4b with emphasis on CBC as UHC scoops lion’s share of Ksh62.3b of health funds
The Education sector has received Sh544.4 billion in the 2022/23 Financial Year budget.
While delivering the budget statement in Parliament yesterday, National Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani pointed out that Sh12 billion will cater for Free Primary Education, another Sh2.5 billion for recruitment of teachers while Sh64.4 billion will go to Free Day Secondary Education including insurance under National Hospital Insurance Fund for secondary school students.
“We are committed to provide access to quality education for our children and youth. This will facilitate realisation of their full potential and enable them to effectively contribute to the development of the country,” said Yatani.
Also out of the allocation, Sh5 billion will go towards examinations fee waiver for Grade Six, Class Eight and Form Four candidates while Sh1.96 billion is for the school feeding programme. The CS also made a proposal to allocate Sh1.2 billion for training of teachers on Competency-Based Curriculum and Sh310 million for the Digital Literacy Programme and ICT integration to secondary schools.
Treasury has set aside Sh4 billion for the construction of CBC classrooms.
At the same time, the Universal Health Coverage got the lion’s share of the Sh146.8 billion proposed for the health sector in the 2022/23 Financial Year in yet another clearest indication the government is keen on seeing its attainment.
Yesterday’s proposal by National Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yatani to allocate UHC Sh62.3 billion saw it up from Sh47.7 billion in the last Financial Year. UHC is one of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s legacy projects as he exits after the August 9 polls.
“Mr Speaker, I propose to allocate Sh146.8 billion to the health sector to support the various programmes aimed at improving health outcomes,” Yatani said in Parliament yesterday when he presented this year’s budget proposals.
“Of this amount Sh47.7 billion will fund activities and programmes for the attainment of Universal Health Coverage,” he added.
The government kicked of UHC pilot programme in four counties – Isiolo, Kisumu, Machakos, and Nyeri – in November 2018 and in February this year, the President launched the national rollout across the 47 counties.
Speaking in Mombasa when he unveiled the full roll out, Uhuru stated that the passage of the NHIF (Amendment) Act was a milestone in Health Insurance, through which the success of UHC will be anchored on.
