The Dag Hammarskjöld Scholarship Fund for Journalists

The memories of Kulwa Mathias, a student in atainted school uniform and mismatching slippers that I met two years ago atNgwihando Primary School in Shinyanga rural, are still fresh in my mind. 
Teachers I talked to at the school said Kulwa wasa famed truant. He had been to school only once in the month before I visitedthe school. And when he attended school, he would disappear shortly after theten O’clock break.
And there was a reason for this. 
“I would go to school everyday if I was sure ofgetting at least one meal a day,” Kulwa told me as he struggled to fight backtears.
Kulwa had to leave school in the early hours sothat he could work in other people’s farms to put food on the table for hiswidowed mother and three siblings. His siblings had never been to schoolbecause the family had no money to buy school uniform. Given the circumstances, who knows, Kulwa might never belucky to complete primary education.
When 147 heads of states and governments met atthe UN Millennium Summit in 2000, one of the Millennium Development Goals thatwere set was to “ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girlsalike, are be able to complete a full course of primary schooling. 
But seven years before the 2015 deadline when allgoals are expected to have been achieved, the 2008 MDGs report shows that it’sstill difficult to keep the likes of Kulwa in school because they are frompoorest households and live in rural areas.
Children like Kulwa who can’t afford schooluniform are more likely to drop out of school, says the report. The report saysprimary school net attendance ratio in the developing regions has increasedfrom 58 percent in 2000 to 76 percent in 2006 but adds that school attendance isbetter in urban areas than in rural areas because of poverty.
“Ensuring that the most vulnerable andmarginalised children are enrolled and remain in school requires targetedprogrammes and interventions aimed at poor households and that seek toeliminate gender disparities,” says the report.
Therefore this goal sets the objective of seeingthat all children – girls as well as boys – go to school and finish primaryeducation. Despite primary schooling being entirely free of charge andcompulsory for every child, but Kulwa still can’t afford uniform and is likelyto drop out of school. To arrest the situation, special attention should begiven to children whose circumstances are particularly difficult.
The report further says that net enrolment ratioin Sub Saharan Africa in 2006 exceeded 90 per cent, and many countries wereclose to achieving universal primary enrolment. Despite the report showingsigns that African countries were on track towards achieving universal accessto primary education, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon warned at the openingceremony of the High-Level meeting on Africa's development needs recently thatcurrent trends indicate that no African country will achieve all the Goals by2015 unless African governments and development partners delivered to theircommitments.
Donors will need to increase their developmentassistance by 18 billion U.S. dollars a year between now and 2010 so as to meettheir pledges made in 2005, according to Ban.
Conversely, the report says several African countriesare on track to achieve universal primary education by 2015 due to tremendousefforts made by African governments and effective support from theirdevelopment partners through highly improved bilateral and multilateral supportprogrammes.
“Countries need to improve curricula, strengthenthe management of education systems, provide better teaching materials andincrease expenditure for the training, hiring and management of teach-ers. Forexample, it is estimated that some 4.5 million new teachers will be required inAfrica to achieve the Millennium Develop-ment Goals by 2015,” according to thereport.
Other reports that were released in the countrytwo years ago show that quality was a major setback in primary schools underthe Primary Education Development Programme (Pedp), which is a programmeinitiated by the country to achieve universal primary education.
The government’s MDGs Progress Report of 2006 saysthat although net enrollment rates had risen to 94.8 percent, it was stilldifficult to retain them in schools especially in rural areas. 
But achieving universal primary education meansmore than full enrolment, says the UN current report, adding that universalprimary means giving priority to quality of education as well.
It calls for national governments to ensure thatall primary school children complete their education in a timely manner willnot only benefit the individual students.
Education budget has increased in countries likeTanzania where the government is spending more than 18 percent of its budget oneducation but the report says education sector remains heavily underfunded.
According to the report, African governmentsshould be supported in rolling out school feeding programmes — using locallyproduced food — that cover all children in primary school. 
A school feeding programme was introduced atKulwa’s school but it collapsed when the World Food Programme and Oxfam pulledout a year after the programme was started. The two organisations wereproviding food during famine. The parents had no food and money to contributeto the school feeding programme when these donors stopped so that truancy couldbe controlled.
The report concludes that despite theachievements, policies and actions need now to be directed at ensuring thatKulwa and other pupils complete the full course of primary schooling inaddition to safeguarding standards.