O’Neill: Children’s education vital

 By JAMES APA GUMUNO

PARENTS who fail to send their children to school will end up in jail, Prime Minister Peter O’Neill says.

O’Neill told a crowd in Mt Hagen last Friday that parents who failed in their responsibility to send their school-aged children to school would be punished.

He said this when announcing that compulsory education for all school-aged children would start next year.

He said parents had a responsibility to raise their children by putting them in school and making them useful in life.

He said children didn’t ask their parents to be brought into this world – it was the decision of the parents.

O’Neill said starting next year when the Outcomes-Based Education was removed and a new curriculum introduced, he wanted to see all the school-aged children in school.

He said the law would deal with parents whose children were roaming around in the villages, towns or cities.

He said when he introduced free education last year, he didn’t say it was an easy thing. It has a good and bad side to it.

He said after seeing the problems it created, the National Government would from next year build more infrastructure in schools and universities to cater for the high number of students enrolling every year.

It is the biggest problem many schools in the country face after the introduction of free education.

He said free education was costing the nation K700 million annually, but it would continue.

O’Neill said the Government had allocated K500 million for capacity building in all the universities in the country to accommodate more students.