Afro barometer Survey proves majority Sierra Leoneans benefited from FQSE

Fredline A. O. M’Cormack-Hale, Research and Policy Director, IGRdoing presentation

By: Amara Kargbo

Afro barometer team in Sierra Leone, led by the Institute for Governance Reform (IGR), has last week released its survey between 2018 and 2019 in Freetown that, majority Sierra Leoneans say they have directly benefited from the Free Quality School Education (FQSE).

Fredline A. O. McCormack-Hale, Research and Policy Director, IGR in an interview said, 73% of Sierra Leoneans have benefited from the Free Quality School Education (FQSE), out of the 73% was not the same across the region, however, the survey discovered that 78% of people in Rural Areas benefiting more than those in other areas.

Madam Hale further explained to this medium that there was an increase of 90%of people who got access to public schools in 2018, she added, there is also a gainsaying that the FQSE led members family to access public schools in 2019 and report conveyed that in 2018, 28% people said they had access to public schools while in 2019, the number increased to 57% that had access to public schools.

In another development, the study illustrated that people who have less poverty would be more likely to be the one who said they are benefiting, that is “richer people benefited than poorer people.”

There is also a drastic drop of accepting bribes to access these public schools, in 2018, 33% of people say they had to bribe to acquire public services and this has gone down to 20% now, she crowned it as a great improvement, a new Afro barometer survey shows.

She described in the survey that,53% of citizens mentioned that the quality had increased, and 81% of people said the government should invest more resources to provide FQSE.

She urged the government to continue providing free education for all pupils even if it leads to an increase in the number of educated citizens who cannot find a job, to save on costs, it would be better if the FFQSE policy only applied to the poor who cannot pay for education, rather than applying to all citizens and to save on costs, it would be better if FQSE policy only applied to pre-primary and primary education, and did not include secondary education.

Afro barometer is a pan-African, nonpartisan survey research network that provides reliable data on African experiences and evaluations of democracy, governance, and quality of life, and this survey was conducted in March 2020 with 1,200 adult Sierra Leoneans that were partaken in the process