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President Yoweri Museveni declared that education in government-aided schools must not be paid for by parents. These remarks were made during his State of the Nation address at the Kololo Ceremonial Ground, yesterday Wednesday 7 June 2023. By eliminating fees in government schools, President Museveni aims to ensure that every child has equal access to education, irrespective of their financial background.

The Government of Uganda introduced Universal Primary Education and Universal Secondary Education programmes to ensure that no child of school-going age misses out on schooling for lack of school fees.

“It is, therefore, unacceptable for school authorities, to demand fees from the parents. The Government will not tolerate this practice. Education must be totally free in government schools,” President Museveni said.

“These programmes were created to provide free education, especially for the poor families that cannot afford to pay the school fees,” President Museveni added.

With the literacy rate currently at 76% while overall school enrolment is at 85 %, President Yoweri Museveni said the demand for free primary and secondary education had increased significantly, which is overwhelming the current education infrastructure.

The government of Uganda is constructing new schools and is rehabilitating primary schools and traditional government-aided secondary schools in order to meet the growing numbers of children in UPE and USE coupled with Uganda’s growing population.

As of March 2023, the Education Management Information System (EMIS) recorded, 13,167 both government-aided and government-owned schools while the primary schools were above 12,000 with the likelihood of increasing since the Government intends to construct new seed schools.

President Yoweri Museveni also declared an ambitious plan to construct new schools by using anticipated oil money, given that Uganda produces 230,000 barrels of oil it hopes to produce per day.

“With our oil money, we shall be able to complete our targets of a government primary school per parish and a government secondary school per sub-county”, President Museveni stated.

The government of Uganda will adopt more policies to promote school learning and accountability in government-supported schools in the next financial year, which include;

Enhancing use of information communication technology (ICT) in government schools and institutions by learners and teachers.

Strengthening the link between education and socio-economic transformation by promotion of science, technology, engineering and mathematics in education, research and incubation.

Enhancing the technical capacity and skilling to support industrial growth especially manufacturing.

Improving the overall staffing levels in schools and development of a complete National Vocational Qualifications Framework.