Education Secretary Sonny Angara on Tuesday said he is eyeing the involvement of local government units, first-class municipalities, and others in the construction of classrooms following a report that only 22 classrooms have been built this year out of the 1,700 targeted for completion.
These findings were disclosed by Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon during a recent Senate finance committee hearing.
In a chance interview in Malacañang, Angara said he wants to change the system wherein only the Department of Public Works and Highways is given the authority to build Department of Education classrooms.
‘What we want now is to include local government units, the provinces, the cities, and first-class municipalities, maybe even second-class ones that have the capacity to build classrooms,’ said Angara.
‘I think the process will be faster, and maybe with the amount of work the DPWH is already doing, they’ve already had a hard time,’ he added.
The issue of flood control projects might have also contributed to the backlog in classrooms.
‘It seems like they were preoccupied with flood control, it seems like building classrooms has not become a priority.’
Angara also vowed to fulfill President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr.’s promise in his State of the Nation Address to build 40,000 classrooms by 2028. /gsg