Let's have only one bursary kitty in every county

A woman purchases a box ahead of school reopening. [Kibata Kihu, Standard]

It's time that all monies meant for bursaries were put under one kitty to bring to an end the duplication in issuance of the money. Why should MPs, governors and MCAs all jostle to give the needy learners bursaries all sourced from the exchequer?

We all agree that education is key to any country's future prosperity and that's why all elected leaders are jostling for funds to support learners. '

As MPs unite to push the Treasury to release money to NGCDF, learners from poor families aren't sure of their fate. Education has become very expensive and that's why Kenyans in their numbers are banking on bursary to keep their young ones in learning institutions.

As at now almost all leaders from the Presidency, the governors, senators, MPs and MCAs all want money bursary set aside for them. The intense interest to in disbursement of the funds between elected leaders, which serves to earn them political mileage, has caused tensions among the leaders themselves as was witnessed recently in Kisii between Governor Simba Arati and MP Silvanus Osoro.

Had the monies been in one basket, the shocking scenes in South Mugirango, where the MP is being accused of interfering with the governor's planned bursary distribution exercise, won't have been witnessed. The two leaders were all said to have been issuing bursaries to needy learners.

Across the country there is duplication of issuance of bursaries, and some lucky learners end up benefitting twice from different sources as others still miss out. Politicians have for years exploited the lack of guidelines on bursaries to continuously award children of their supporters at the expense of the deserving poor.

Parliament should, as a matter of priority, deliberate on how to harmonise them issuance of bursary. The current confusion has seen undeserving cases benefiting throughout their school life while the poor keep on begging for the same with some missing out completely.

In some cases, governors have now opted to sideline MCAs from determining the would-be beneficiaries and opted to handle the exercise from their offices. Even as some MCAs protest that the governors are using the new move to sideline those seen as not being very loyal to them.

Yet in some areas, MPs have decided without any consultations to award NGCDF bursaries to those in forms 3 and 4 and those in tertiary institutions, leaving out those in form 1 and 2 to the county leadership. In some cases, governors are sponsoring a number of students right from Form 1 to Form 4.

Due to lack of clear policies on bursary disbursement, cases abound of duplication of the issuance of the bursaries with same learners benefiting from different government sources. Under the harmonised programme, records should be availed at the village levels of the needy cases and how much they deserve and then they all be accorded financial support from a common county kitty.

By so doing, the government will save millions of shillings which go to waste through kickbacks. The NGCDF funds should sent to the county governments and the MPs brought on board during the funds' disbursement through county development committees or boards.

-Mr Omanga is a media practitioner