Uganda – et af Danidas største samarbejdslande i Afrika – mener selv det er godt på vej mod at opfylde 2015 Målene
KAMPALA, 29 September 2008: Nearly every school day, 14-year old Gloria Abako from Endru Primary School in Arua district agonises about taking afternoon lessons on an empty stomach.
– My parents say they do not have money to pack food for me every day. I cannot go back home to eat something because it is very far, said the primary six pupil.
Like Avako, who is one of over seven million Ugandan children benefitting from the “free” primary education programme launched in 1997, her school has failed to provide all basic academic needs..
At Endru Primary School, only pupils in the top three classes sit on desks. The rest are condemned to the often cold, dusty floors.
Rev. Nason Mindrea, the headmaster, says his school currently has 1.529 pupils, 660 of whom are female, but does not have sufficient facilities for all their needs.
– We had benches but they got spoilt and replacing them takes time. There are also other things like sanitary needs for girls. We also don’t have safe water, he noted.
Rev. Mindrea says his school – with a teacher-pupil ratio of 1:59, well above the 1:40 recommended by the education ministry – also needs more teachers.
Such challenges have consistently dogged many schools under the Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme. UPE has increased enrolment in primary schools from 3,1 million in 1996 to over 7,2 million today, but failure by government to provide sufficient facilities threatens its success.
Statistics show that the Ugandan national completion rate fell from 60 per cent in 2004 to 48 per cent in 2006. These are some of the challenges that Uganda has to contend with in its effort to achieve Millennium Development Goal (MDG – 2015 Mål) two; providing basic primary education to all children by 2015.
– Some of these pupils go up to primary seven without knowing how to write their names. The standard of education has collapsed. We need to revisit our commitment to this programme, said Terego County MP Kassiano Wadri, at a recent dissemination of the progress report on the MDGs in Arua district.
The MDGs are eight development targets that the international community has agreed to achieve by 2015. They are reducing poverty and hunger, promoting gender equality and empowering women, reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, ensuring environmental sustainability and developing a global partnership for development.
President Yoweri Museveni is confident Uganda is on course to meet all but one or two of the MDGs. Addressing the UN General Assembly in New York last Monday, he said:
– I see no reason why these goals should not be achievable. Other than HIV/AIDS, which is behaviour-related, I am sure all the others are achievable if we do enough political-led sensitisation and investment.
But countrywide findings show that there are challenges to be overcome before the goals are met. The 2007 MDG progress report, prepared by the UN Development Programme (UNDP), says Uganda is likely to achieve six of the eight goals.
In its assessment of the challenges, the report says Uganda could fail to reduce, by two thirds, the number of children who die before their fifth birthday or reduce, by three quarters, the number of mothers dying during childbirth.
Uganda only reduced its maternal mortality rate between 2001 and 2006 from 505 to 435 deaths per 100.000 births. Now, it needs to reduce it to at least 108 deaths per 100.000 births to meet the goal.
Health minister Stephen Mallinga recently decried the rate at which expectant mothers die from haemorrhage infection due to lack of antibiotics. His ministry has since introduced a new, low- cost drug called Misoprostol to prevent bleeding after birth.
The UNDP report says Uganda further needs to improve access to obstetric (fødsels) emergency health care facilities for handling life threatening complications related to pregnancy, increase the number and skills of health personnel, as well as provide more financial resources.
Where Uganda has registered considerable success is in the effort to reduce poverty levels. Government says it has reduced the number of Ugandans living below the poverty line from 56 per cent in 1993 to 31 per cent, and, according to the UNDP report, if the trend continues, this goal can be achieved.
Uganda is also well on the way to achieving MDG six; combating the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, although experts warn that complacency could diminish the current achievements.
In the last five years, the HIV/AIDS prevalence rate has stagnated at 6 percent yet the East African country registers 135.000 new cases of HIV every year.
The latest World Malaria Report by the World Health Organisation commends Uganda for reducing the malaria cases from 16 million in 2005 to 12 million in 2006 through the provision of insecticide treated nets especially to children and pregnant women, indoor residual spraying and availability of anti malarial drugs.
Another goal, according to the UNDP report, that Uganda could achieve if there is no reversal in current trends, is the promotion of gender equality and women empowerment.
The report says that with more girls in school, more women in gainful employment and participating in politics, the delay in passing the Domestic Relations Bill to address social injustices remains one of the few stumbling blocks.
The report says Uganda needs to increase funding to vital sectors like education and health to overcome the demands of an ever increasing population and, subsequently, meet some of the MDGs.
It adds that governments now have to contend with new challenges like the global economic slowdown, the worldwide food security crisis, and climate change as they strive to achieve the MDGs.
Kilder: The Monitor (Uganda) og The Push Journal
