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Written by Our Senior Staff
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Friday, 10 August 2012 05:45 |
The Coalition for Transparency and Accountability in Education (COTAE), a conglomerate of civil society organizations in Liberia has launched its second phase of engagement with the education sector.
The launch took place yesterday at the Corina Hotel in Sinkor when a number of educators including members of COTAE assembled to grace the ceremony.
Cllr. T. Negbalee Warner, Managing Partner-Heritage Partners, formally launched the second phase of the OSIWA sponsored project, acknowledging the poor state of Liberia’s educational system, which he said the launch and discussions at the occasion would help to lead Liberians in taking positive steps for improving education in the country.
Cllr. Warner said education is sole fundamental to individual communities’ national development that a pace at which one develops or the country develops is proportional to.
He noted that one wants to see Liberia developed noting, “ we all want to see competent manpower, competent medical doctors, competent engineers, competent teachers, or the professionals that will help our country with quality delivery of services and a manpower” to govern the country.
However, Cllr. Warner said Liberians cannot achieve such goals without quality education, and that quality education cannot be possible when there exist unchecked corruption, lack of public interest, lack of monitoring organizations of activities in the educational system, as well as poor accountability in the sector or inadequate involvement of all stakeholders in taking decisions affecting the sector.
He hailed the role of COTAE in the endeavor aimed at renewing development in the educational sector as exhibited by COTAE’s latest released report, which the learned Counselor assumed would further prompt an interrogation about the system.
Meanwhile, the National Coordinator of COTAE, Thomas Doe-Nah, has stressed that the Liberian educational system has many challenges that need prompt attention.
Giving an overview of the project, he said the coalition’s intervention has realized the need for a third party in tackling those problems affecting the educational sector.
Mr. Nah disclosed that the two-year OSIWA funded project has enabled COTAE to crisscross Liberia and glimpse at good and bad things many Liberians do not know about in the educational system.
According to him, COTAE is interested in seeing score cards for school boards in the counties, while tracking down the expenditure of the county boards being set up by the Ministry of Education is also concentrated.
He said how much is being channeled through the ministry to the boards as well as how effective the boards are in conducting meetings in their respective counties for the purpose of accountability and good governance of school activities that could lead to the provision of quality education matters very much.
Two panelists who spoke at the ceremony on the topic: “ Advancing Quality Education for National Transformation- Challenges and Solutions” were Action Aid Liberia Country Director, Korto Reeves Williams and Sister Mary Lourene Brown of Stella Maris Polytechnic who is also President of OSF.
COTAE is made up of the Center for Transparency and Accountability (CENTAL), Liberia Technical Committee for Education for All (LETCOM), Federation of Liberian Youths (FLY) and Liberian Institute of Certified Public Accountants (LICPA) and Liberia Economic Journalists Association (LEJA); writes Lewis K. Glay 0886469835/lglay.inprofile@gmail.com |
