Speech of Hon. Minister of Education and Scientific Research
on the occasion of the opening of the
Regional Conference on Renewal of Secondary Education in Africa

Mr. A. Parsuramen, Director UNESCO/BREDA

Mr. Jacob Bregman, Lead Specialist, World Bank

Distinguished Experts

Ladies and Gentlemen

It is a very great honour for me as Minister of Education and Scientific Research of Mauritius to address you on the occasion of the Regional Conference of Experts on the renewal of Secondary Education.

The Government of Mauritius, which I represent here today, is deeply appreciative of the honour and respect thus paid to our country by the sister States of Africa and by the Director of Unesco/Breda. This respect, which indeed is a bond of sincere friendship ~ is made manifest in the desire, so frequently expressed, to make Mauritius the meeting place for some of the most important conferences of African States.

The honour that you do us is thus equalled only by the pleasure that I have in welcoming you to our country. I express to you our most cordial welcome, and with it the hope that the business of this Meeting will nevertheless leave you some time to make the acquaintance of the Paradise Island that awaits you. I would also express the hope that your short stay here will be not just a passing visit but an opportunity for you to become one with a country whose hospitality is traditional and whose natural surroundings, like the people themselves, receive you from the outset as friends.

We are met together here to fulfill a purpose that is clear and to study certain problems whose importance is manifest to all. The work to be done leaves little room for lengthy speeches and for this reason I shall not recount in detail the motives which have prompted the holding of this Meeting. Within the field of operation of UNESCO, the Director of BREDA has already given his attention to these problems, and to him I must express my gratitude. The World Bank representative has also made a good overview of this workshop.

When the Ministers of Education last met in Johannesburg, South Africa from 6 - 10 December 1999, at the Regional Conference on Education for all for Sub-Saharan Africa, we made certain commitments and it is only fair enough 2 years later to mention some of these. We reaffirmed that education is a basic right and a basic need for all African children, youth and adults including those with disabilities, as recognised in the international instruments. We recognised that investment in quality education is a prerequisite for the empowerment of African to fully participate in and benefit from a globalised economy and modern communications technology. We committed ourselves to removing all barriers that hinder African children, youth and adults from having access to quality education and the attainment of the goals of the Jomtien Declaration on Education for all. We also recognised the necessity for education systems to provide all our people with the opportunity to acquire the skills and knowledge essential for access and use of information and communication technology, as well as the necessity for curriculum transformation to give children, youth and adults the type of quality education that promotes appreciation of diversity, richness and dynamism of our cultures, with a goal to liberate us from psychological, economic and technological dependency.

That Conference also revealed the extent of the efforts being made to develop education in the countries of Africa, but at the same time it was recognized that those efforts could not be fully effective unless they were accompanied by the closest possible adaptation of the teaching of the physical, economic and human conditions of each and every country.

For our meeting of this week, as we seek solutions to bring about a renewal in secondary education, a sub-sector that has for long suffered due to lack of concentration and funding, we need not to repeat the mistakes that all newly independent countries made at the time of political independence. When we achieved independence, education in most of the countries of Africa was modelled on that of the metropolitan countries and in some cases it represented purely and simply a local application of European educational systems - Belgian, British or French. The content of the education thus provided did not correspond to the realities of our countries: it corresponded neither to the essential demands of technical progress nor to the necessities of political independence. We had given too much of a certain type of instruction to the detriment of education itself, which is none other than the all-round development of the human being. As we debate new reforms that have to be brought about we need to remember that there are no uniform solutions or ready-made recipes for all countries. Our search should be for reforms that will work, that will be politically, culturally and financially acceptable and feasible. We cannot be debating issues in the abstract. We do not want recommendations built on theory and over-speculative studies, conducted, what is more, in a context that is foreign to them. We should be open to all the best practices in other parts of the world and learn from the mistakes and positive experiences of others.

It is for you, Ladies and Gentlemen, to work out, through the sessions of this Meeting, a solution to this state of affairs; no doubt it can only be a partial solution, but it will be one that tends increasingly towards the all-round development of the individual in an education system that will provide lifelong learning opportunities to all, focusing on the learner and the learning process in safe and inspiring learning environments that foster critical thinking and creativity.

Little by little we must each work out a humanism that is appropriate to our particular country and at the same time founded on universal values in such a way that each civilization will fit harmoniously into the concert of all the civilizations of the world.

At a time when the countries with highly developed technological civilizations seem to be in search of a new humanism we ought not to lag behind. It is our good fortune to have escaped the conflict between traditional humanism and the imperatives of technological civilization.

It is up to us, I believe, to promote in our countries a true technological humanism, always bearing in mind that technical development will of necessity be just beginning and, among the rural masses, the poor, the neglected, the excluded, of very modest proportions and that our civilization will be one of simple tools rather than of massive machines - though for all that we ought not to neglect industrial expansion wherever it is possible.

As you will deliberate on a renewal of secondary education you need to remember that to bring life to an environment of technological creativity, people need to have technical skills. Governments will invest in the development of those skills because today's technological transformations increase the premium on such skills and change the demand for different types of skills. I am aware that this calls for a rethinking of our education and training policies. In some countries systems need an overhaul. In others, a redirection of public funds. How much for public education ? For Science? For formal education ? For vocational training? Tough choices, indeed. As we increase public investments in learning, as we spend the tax money of the populace, we want to be clearer where we should direct these investments. Have today's technological transformations made the returns to secondary education as high as those to primary education - or even higher ? Are there ways to increase flows to education beyond simply expending public spending ? You will need to consider these questions also as you debate the issues mentioned earlier by
Mr. Parsuramen, Director of Breda.

We have in Mauritius embarked on a very ambitious project of secondary education renewal and this workshop is most timely in that it will help our technicians to benefit from the long-standing wisdom of the myriad of experts that we have physically been able to host for one week. We sincerely believe that the Mauritian education development will certainly depend a lot on the recommendations of this workshop and out government is committed to providing the necessary attention and resources that will be needed to bring about these reforms.

However, greater resources and higher enrolments alone are not enough. The quality and orientation of education at each level, and the link with the demand for skills, are critical for mastering technology, Primary education for all is essential. It develops some of the most basic capabilities for human development. And it creates a base of numeracy and literacy that enables people to be more innovative and productive. But secondary and higher education are also crucial for technology development. Secondary and university: education creates highly skilled individuals who reap the benefits through higher salaries. But it is also at the heart of creating national capacity to innovate, to adapt technology to the country's needs and to manage the risks of technological change - benefits that touch all of society.

Our education, then, ought to be governed by the dictates of a genuine technological humanism directed towards the real needs of our countries.

We must have no preconceived or dogmatic ideas concerning the child. We see him as he is. We want to educate him and to watch him live, to help live, within the lasting context of his physical, intellectual and social environment.

It is for these reasons that we consider the work that is beginning here today to be of such importance. I sincerely hope that the synergy that this meeting will generate can only spill over the whole of Africa and lead to that great African Renaissance that our leaders have been dreaming about for a long time now.

It will be our responsibility to bring up the children of our lands to be the grown men both of their own countries and of the whole world. We will here look to you for that guidance which will help to make our children citizens of a nation and citizens of humanity.

For this I give you my thanks in anticipation and I wish you courage in your deliberations. It is now my pleasure to declare this Workshop open.