Eritrea: Cabinet of Ministers holds meeting

By Shabait

Asmara, 08 September 2017- The Cabinet of Ministers held a meeting at State House yesterday morning to review progress and deliberate on new programmes in the sectors of education and health.

Access to education in all levels – elementary, middle/high school as well as tertiary - has quadrupled in aggregate terms in the past 25 years. Total school enrollment in the academic year 2016-17 was over 740,000. Gender equity is growing at a substantial pace with overall female student enrollment hovering at around 43%. Even geographic distribution of schools throughout the country is another vital policy objective that the Ministry of Educations has pursued vigorously in the past years through the funneling of substantial

In this context, the Cabinet of Ministers discussed ways and means of enhancing the quality of education, the expansion of technical and vocational schools, the wider application of information technology, other supportive facilities as well as better infrastructural and administrative frameworks in all the schools. The optimal alignment of education with the Government’s overall development strategies and objectives was another issue discussed in greater depth. In this regard, the Cabinet of Ministers stressed the need to buttress the ongoing internal review underway by the Ministry of Education in all these areas with an external audit as well as through additional inputs of relevant Ministries and sectors.

Regarding the health sector, the Cabinet of Ministers reviewed efforts exerted to provide health services to the public through expanding health facilities across the country; various programmes launched to control communicable and non-communicable diseases; the expansion of vaccination programmes; and ensuring the health of the public in general and that of mothers and children in particular. Progress and challenges of human resources development in the sector; supply of medicines and status of domestic drug production were also examined in greater detail.

In the health sector too, a comprehensive review will be undertaken to gauge the standards of equipment of regional and referral hospitals, the human resources development programmes and related parameters.

At the end of the session, President Isaias Afwerki gave a briefing to the Cabinet of Ministers on recent diplomatic developments regarding simmering tensions and trends in the wider Horn of Africa Middle Eastern region.

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