Sri Lanka Marxist alliance accuses government of slashing education budget and causing the system to collapse

Sri Lanka's Marxist party, Democratic National Alliance (DNA) Wednesday accused the government of slashing the capital expenditure granted to the education sector in the country by 42 percent in the last three years.



The DNA charged that the move had resulted in the collapse of the entire education system.
DNA parliamentary group leader Anura Kumara Dissanayake seconding an adjournment motion on the education sector in parliament said that capital expenditure in the national budget for education in 2007 was Rs. 8 billion. However in 2008 this was reduced to Rs.5.2 billion and in 2009 to Rs.4.6 billion.

"Capital expenditure has been slashed by 42 percent in the last three years. How can the education sector be developed by cutting funds," Dissanayake queried, adding that the funds allocated for education from the national budget in 2009 was just 2.1 percent of Gross Domestic Production (GDP).
Dissanayake noted that according to UNICEF, the world standard for education allocations must be at least 6 percent of the GDP, while in Sri Lanka this figure has been lower than 3 percent of GDP since 2004.
He also referred to the closure of schools in the country and said that since 1997, a total of 948 schools have closed in the country.
Dissanayake explained that when taken as an average, it would amount to 79 schools closing down annually from 1977 to 2009 and that since 1997 six schools have closed every month and one school has closed down every six days.