Gov’t boosts education infrastructure with $31.5B investment
Minister of Education Priya Manickchand delivering remarks at the ministry’s end-of -year press conference (Delano Williams photo)
Minister of Education Priya Manickchand delivering remarks at the ministry’s end-of -year press conference (Delano Williams photo)

–between 2020 and 2024, Minister Manickchand says

WITH significant focus being placed on improving access to education at all levels across Guyana, Minister of Education Priya Manickchand has said that over $31.5 billion has been expended on education infrastructure.
The minister outlined this during the presentation of her 2024 annual report on the work of the ministry.

She said that this sum catered for the construction, rehabilitation and extension of schools across Guyana.
“From 2020 to 2024 we’ve spent $31,529,228,360 on infrastructure,” she said.

On new constructions some $13 billion was expended, reconstruction $7 billion, major extensions accounted for $8 billion and major rehabilitations amounted to $2 billion.

Giving a regional breakdown of sums spent, the minister noted, “Region One, we’ve spent $870 million; in Region Two, $3.6 billion; in Region Three, $3.5 billion; in Region Four, $8.3 billion; in Region Five, $897 million; in Region Six, $751 million; in Region Seven, $2.4 billion; in Region Eight, $1.8 billion; in Region Nine, $2.8 billion; in Region 10, $825 million, and in Georgetown, $5.3 billion.”

While she added that it includes schools at all levels, she noted that specifically for secondary schools, one of the promises of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) government is to deliver universal secondary education, and the government is inching closer to this.

Manickchand indicated that all have seen the major expansions happening in secondary education across the country.
Against this backdrop, she specifically noted that secondary schools were built or are being built in all regions except for Region Five.

Manickchand went on to note that while persons may look at the investment as a purely dollar and cents investment, what is important to her is the offering of seats to children across the country who previously might not have had access to secondary education.

“We are currently building 37 secondary schools across this country,” Minister Manickchand said.
This number, she indicated, equates to just around one third of all secondary schools that exist now being done in one term of under the Irfaan Ali led government.
The expansion and addition of new schools, Manickchand said, comes as the numbers of students continue to increase and also to ensure access to education.

Going back, she gave an example of not having some 3,000 spaces at secondary schools in Georgetown and Region Three, just as the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA) results were about to be announced some years ago.

At the present moment, she noted that some students were at primary-tops which she said is not a place the government wants it to be in.
As such, Manickchand affirmed: “We’re not people who wring our hands, we’re people who find solutions.”

Meanwhile, in addition to secondary schools, the minister indicated that primary schools and nursery schools are being built where they were non-existent.
While according to the United Nations, Guyana has already achieved universal primary education, the government will still ensure they are looking to make sure they either rebuild where necessary or build new primary schools where none existed.

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