Luanda - The Vice-President of Angola, Esperança da Costa, Thursday in Luanda, instructed the members of the Commission for the Implementation of the Project for the Empowerment of Girls and Learning for All (PAT II) to improve the execution of the planned actions.
This was during the 2nd Ordinary Session of the Commission for the PAT II implementation, whose agenda included the presentation of the Degree of Compliance with the Recommendations of the 1st Session, the Balance of Project Activities, as well as the challenges and constraints on the Implementation of PAT II.
Speaking at the end of the meeting, Luísa Grilo, Minister of Education, said the Vice-President stressed that the work with the Ministries of Justice and Territorial Administration should be strengthened, since some students don't have the identification cards needed to open a bank account, as well as the issue of ATM cards.
The Vice-President also instructed the commission to improve the mechanisms for better connection with National Bank of Angola, with the aim to speed up the provision of ATM cards for scholarship beneficiaries.
Luísa Grilo said that by July of this year this item should be overcome, so that more than 100,000 debit cards can be issued for students who will now begin the first phase of the generalization of the scholarship program.
The minister underlined that the project plans to award around 170,000 scholarships this year, and that almost 12 million US dollars have already been spent.
"One thing that has become clear here is that the funds are decentralized from bank accounts that are supervised and participated in by the finance delegates. And these funds are only made available through a specific activity, duly validated and approved by the World Bank, without which no action can take place,"Grilo said.
The minister said the commission has called for better mechanisms for liaising with the other sectors so that the funds can be made available as quickly as expected.
Grilo said the meeting served to take stock of the actions that are being carried out and to use the Vice-President's guidelines to improve the aspects identified as weak, and to gather contributions from other ministerial departments.
The minister said the constraints related to scholarships have been overcome, with opening of accounts for provincial and municipal education departments, with 43 bank accounts currently active.
Grilo said the PAT II project has actions in three areas, namely staff training (teachers, school headmasters and supervisors), health education (school, reproductive and menstrual), as well as scholarships, which account for more than 60 percent of the total amount allocated by the World Bank.
Coordinated by the Vice-President of the Republic, the commission is responsible, among other things, for monitoring and scrupulously complying with the three structuring components of PAT II - empowering Angolan girls, reducing learning poverty in Angola and managing, monitoring and evaluating the project.
In addition, the commission is responsible for creating the technical, material and human conditions for the implementation of PAT II. PA/VIC/ADR/AMP
