The number of official course books has increased to six per subject, by the minister’s count.
Policy decisions must always be made in the public interest, and never at the whims of a few selfish public officials and well-connected business brokers
Given that only one publisher will now pass the door, the publishers’ aggression to get their books picked is only set to become more intense and vicious.
Education secretary Fred Matiang’is directive that pupils should henceforth use only one government-approved text book for every subject will come as a big relief to many parents.
This is because parents have for many years suffered immense financial loss at the hands of cartels who, through collusion with the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) officials, have continuously added onto the course-approved text books list.
The number of official course books has increased to six per subject, by the minister’s count.
Parents are required to buy their children up to four textbooks per subject, a huge financial burden that does not in any way improve the quality of learning.
The learners cannot possibly cover all the books within the allocated school terms, and most are untouched at the end of the year.
Even worse is that the course books tend to have similar content, defeating the purpose for the multiple purchases.
As Dr Matiang’i noted, marketing managers of publishing firms and corrupt KICD officials have been the biggest beneficiaries of the regressive policy.
All that a publisher needed was to know people at KICD, and their books would be put on the course list guaranteeing them multi-million sales.
Policy decisions must always be made in the public interest, and never at the whims of a few selfish public officials and well-connected business brokers. The Matiang’i directive should be implemented immediately.
The minister should also extend the directive to private schools to save the long-suffering parents from the yoke of profiteers.
Given the big numbers and the crucial role that private schools play in the Kenyan education system, it would make sense for the government to also cushion parents from escalating costs by legislating policies that promote uniformity.
Unfortunately, the Matiang’i directive could also breed another problem.
Given that only one publisher will now pass the door, the publishers’ aggression to get their books picked is only set to become more intense and vicious. The kickbacks to KICD officials are also only likely to get bigger.
This can, however, be minimised by crafting well thought-out guidelines to make the course book selection process fair and transparent.
An independent panel that consists of KICD officials, independent observers and the publishers’ representatives could be one viable option.
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