The Council of Governors on the recommendations on education report

The Council of Governors Legal, Constitutional Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations and the Education Committee have just concluded a consultative meeting to discuss the implications of the recommendations of the Presidential Working Party on Education

Reforms

The Council recognizes the importance of education as a key driver of socio-economic development and welcomes efforts aimed at improving the education sector in the country.

It is important to note that County Governments have made tremendous efforts towards transforming the devolved education functions assigned to them by the Constitution. Currently, County Governments are managing approximately 30,400 pre-primary schools, have employed over 54,000 pre-primary teachers and over 2.3 million children are accessing pre-primary education across the Counties. Further, County Governments cumulatively allocate over 8 billion every year towards education. This was unheard of before devolution where pre-primary education was mainly supported by the communities. Since the function was devolved before costing, it is important to note that, Counties have achieved all this with no specific financial resource having been devolved to support the pre-primary education function.

48 Governments, 1 Nation

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While we appreciate the efforts made by the Presidential Working Party towards the transformation of the education sector, the Council of Governors urges that further consultations must be undertaken to ensure that the perspectives and concerns of County Governments are adequately considered in the realization of the recommendations.

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To this end, the recommendations of the Presidential Working Party are unacceptable to the Council they heavily claw back on Devolution.

These include:

1. The establishment of a comprehensive school system where all levels of learning are headed by one head of institution without regard to delineated functions in the Constitution. We note that- there is no accountability framework provided for the proposed Head of Institutions to the Counties regarding the management of Pre-primary schools.
2. The report also recommends that the Ministry of Education, Teachers Service Commission, and COG to develop an intergovernmental agreement for hiring and remuneration of pre-primary teachers. 3. Further, the report recommends the amendment to the basic education act to have the County commissioner as the County Education Board. This is a clear reverse gear to the gains of devolution noting that ECDE is a fully devolved function.
3. Hiring of pre-primary teachers is a preserve of the County Governments as reiterated in the judgment in the High Court ruling in the case of KNUT vs. The Attorney General and 4 others (2016) that clarified the powers of the County Governments in hiring pre-primary teachers.
4. Framework for the facilitation of development partners who support education in the country. The Framework should allow the Ministry of Education to coordinate the partners supporting the National Education Function while the COG to coordinate partners supporting the devolved education function, among others.

48 Governments, 1 Nation

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We have collectively agreed to the following:

1. The Council of Governors categorically does not agree and rejects the recommendations in entirety to the extent that they undermines the basic structure and framework of the constitution
2. The Council of Governors hereby withdraws its participation from any process that seeks to legislate the recommendations contained in the report. This includes the proposed meeting called by Inter- Governmental Relations Technical Committee scheduled for 16th

January, 2023.

3. County Governments will continue to manage both the institutions and Human resources for the constitutionally assigned functions in Education.
4. A convening of any devolved sector forum will strictly be done

between the two levels of government and no other entity.

Lastly, the Committee strongly protests against all the recent attempts to claw back on devolution in the education sector and other seen attempts across devolved sectors

In conclusion, the Council of Governors reiterates its commitment to enhance the quality of education and training in our country.