By Bida Elly David
The Ministry of Higher Education is calling on government to allocate a portion of oil revenue to boost learning institutions in the country, as the country’s education sectors face financial deficits.
Gabriel Changson Chang, the Minister of Higher Education raised the concern this week during the inception of a renovated administration block at University of Juba.
The minister said that injecting money to improve the physical structures of higher institutions of learning in the country, commenting that, it was one way to motivate students towards good academic performance.
“Road projects are being funded by the revenues generated from the oil sector. Why the oil revenues shouldn’t be portioned to develop the national institutions of learning. Developing high institutions of learning would create a conducive learning environment to the students,” Minister Changson said.
Mr. Chang stressed that a situation through which a country produces capable and qualified human resources will be determined by the physical structures of the institutions and the level of academic scheme.
“We are tasked as educationists to develop competent human resource. How do we develop that human resource when the environment is not conducive for learning? This is a big challenge. So, there should be affirmative atmospheric conditions where students and teaching staff are well accommodated for good learning progress,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Vice Chancellor of University of Juba, Prof. John Akech echoed that the university has developed a concept note, and a master plan for upgrading the campus’ International Pre-school and secondary but it all ended on a piece of paper due to financial deficit, the paper remains tabled.
In addition, Prof. Akech stated that, their only hope would focus on percentage of income they earn from technology city, to meet their construction plan.
“We are looking at the development in custom area being one of the incomes generating mechanism. With the new development at the custom area, the only part imposed by the university in the technology city is to give us the percentage of the income that is generated and to adhere to the harmonious looks of the whole varsity construction master plan. We are also set to accept grants or borrowings for some of these facilities depending on their will to donate or to lend,” John Akech said.
However, the VC added that, despite the drawbacks, the major thing to prioritise should be the remuneration for civil servants that should occur in time.
He said, through harmony and hard work, South Sudan will be a conducive scope of learning by valuing the education sector.