Collapsing all bursaries and public scholarship schemes and consolidating it into one fund will not make education free in Kenya, Tetu MP Geoffrey Wandeto has said.

Mr Wandeto argues that the amount of education funding achieved through various bursary schemes contributes to a paltry 25 percent of the total cost required by learners.

He termed the push to have all the schemes disbanded to introduce free education for all learners as ‘unattainable’.

“When you compile all the education bursaries from the area MP, woman representative, governor and the presidential bursary scheme, they all amount to about 25 percent of the learners' required cost. We still remain with 75 percent of the cost which is covered by the parents,” Mr Wandeto said.

The first-time MP was addressing journalists at Kagumo Teachers Training College on Thursday where he chaired the 2nd annual Tetu Constituency Education Managers Conference.

“I think there are a lot of untruths on this issue of realizing free education. Saying that we can offer free education when we disband and consolidate all these bursary funds, is not true because we need significantly more money to meet the required total cost,” Mr Wandeto said.

However, Mr Wandeto noted that there has been duplication in issuance of education bursaries, a matter he said can be resolved by consolidating the funds under the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF).

“We can consolidate some of the bursaries because in some instances, there have been cases of duplication. You can find the same parent benefiting from bursary funds issued by the MP, woman representative, governor and the presidential bursary scheme,” the lawmaker said.

He said NG-CDF has over the years had proper structures that have ensured seamless and equal disbursement of bursaries to learners.

“My proposal is that since the NG-CDF bursary scheme is the majority, we need to consolidate all the other scattered schemes together under the NG-CDF kitty. MPs have run bursary schemes for a long time. They have developed structures and systems to run it effectively. Let us use the method that seems to be delivering the best results,” Mr Wandeto said.

Recently, National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetangula directed the formulation of Laws to collapse all bursaries and public scholarships into one fund.

Mr Wetangula observed that the layers of duplication in the award of bursaries from the NG-CDF, counties, and the Ministry of Education reveal glaring inconsistencies.

“You find the MP is giving the bursary, the MCA is giving the bursary, the governor... the woman rep... they all come from the same source,” Mr Wetangula said.

Mr Wandeto held consultative meetings with school managers from 46 primary schools in the constituency.