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The Storm's Eye by Prof.Rajiva Wijesingha

A few days back I was asked by the Ministry of Education to assist them in replying to some Audit queries they had received. These were addressed to the Secretary, but since they related to the English medium materials project I handle, it was thought I should be consulted.

I wanted initially refuse since, while I was happy to work without pay for children bravely studying in English, I had no obligation to slave for the Ministry. However, the Director of the Project under which the materials are funded is an amiable soul who, if not dynamic (impossible, for a career educationist), is not an obstruction, so I agreed to help.

The Audit queries exceeded my wildest dreams of how far a government department intended to prevent waste and corruption could go in preventing action. I was reminded of Baku Mahadeva remarking long ago how, as Secretary to the Treasury, he could spend millions on special projects, but needed several approvals to buy a stapler.

The present day Auditor General however - or rather his minions, because clearly the poor man signs what is put in front of him without checking - seems dissatisfied with Financial Regulations alone, but instead thinks he is a watchdog as to policy too.

The present set of Audit queries begins by claiming that the National Institute of Education is responsible for textbooks, and goes so far as to quote a clause in the NIE Act which it claims gives it that responsibility.

Not surprisingly, the man who came to me on behalf of the Ministry had not thought to check the Act. As I found when I was at the Ministry, hardly anyone there has bothered to read any Act. Being a thorough sort, I had spent hours worrying the poor legal officer until she gave me a photocopy of that and other relevant Acts, though regrettably her archives were not complete, and she wasn't sure sometimes where or how to find out the exact legal position.

Not surprisingly, the Auditor General had misidentified the clause he quoted. When we checked, it was to find that the clause he mentioned empowered the NIE to conduct studies with regard to education. How that could be interpreted to mean it alone could produce textbooks was beyond me except that, in my recent dealings with government officers, I have discovered a total lack of professionalism about looking at the facts in such instances.

The Attorney General's Department, for instance, when asked to prosecute in a particular instance, responded that it could not recommend a prosecution because of a particular clause in an Act.

When we checked on the clause, it was to find that it was the clause requiring us to get the Department's permission to prosecute. Only in Sri Lanka, and Kafkaland, would someone say, 'You can't cross the road here because you need my permission to cross the road here.'

Only in Sri Lanka - not even in Kafkaland - would this be generally accepted as an incontrovertible reason why the road should not be crossed.

The Audit query goes on to greater absurdities, culminating in an instruction to the Secretary to get a report from the Director General of the NIE about the quality of the translations produced. Obviously the Auditor General has not read the Ordinance, which gives the Minister the right to prescribe what should be studied in schools, nor the NIE Act which makes it clear that the NIE functions under the authority of a Council chaired by the Secretary.

Unfortunately the NIE, created by Ranil, as its objectives make clear, to develop high quality professional teachers and teacher educators, having failed signally in that respect, cherishes an empire built up by other means.

It was an official of the World Bank who suggested to me, when he heard that the Multiple Book Option was being sabotaged from within the educational establishment, that the very top of the NIE was responsible.

This may not have been true, but it is indicative of perceptions regarding the desperate measures that may be taken to guard the utterly destructive monopolies the NIE now enjoys.

It is no wonder that Eric de Silva, Ranil's first Secretary, mentioned at a recent seminar that he wondered whether the NIE had not outlived its usefulness, and might better be abolished. Impossible, I would say, since even Eric, despite Ranil's great faith in him, finds that the report on restructuring education he had produced so urgently, has languished unimplemented for nearly a year.

But meanwhile, with allies in the Auditor General's Department, the NIE can claim even more powers, along with responsibilities that it is singularly incapable of fulfilling - and the Auditor General will ensure that whatever work is being done by others will be clamped down on firmly.

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