Reshuffle lends no benefit to nation's education

Woravat Auapinyakul lost his post as education minister in the latest Cabinet reshuffle. The fact that he stayed at the helm of the Education Ministry for just five months led to criticism that the government paid little attention to education. That is partially true, but a bigger point is education goals could be achieved if the government had clear and well-planned policies, besides populist short-term goals.
In recent history, Thaksin Shinawatra has led five administrations either openly or from behind the scenes. When combined, these five administrations have run the country for nearly 10 years. In these administrations, the post of education minister has always been allocated to the ruling party that is under the control of Thaksin.
Therefore, had these governments focused not only on populist educational policies for their short-term political advantages, the country’s education would have progressed much further by now. Thaksin, however, is clearly good at carving out tempting populist policies.
Even in the educational arena, his populist tactics worked magic for his political gain.
Before his now-defunct Thai Rak Thai won the general election for the first time, Thaksin unveiled a “One District, One Scholarship” policy. Through this, students from rural secondary schools were promised a much greater chance to claim a scholarship to further their education overseas.
Problems with the scheme, however, became evident as some scholarship recipients were not really prepared to deal with life overseas. After one of them committed suicide, the scheme was seriously questioned.
The Lab School project, introduced by the Thaksin-led government, sounded great in the beginning, too. It won much applause at first but there was doubt later on as headmasters/headmistresses in rural areas complained of their difficulty in finding the budget to maintain computers and IT infrastructure. One school director in Narathiwat’s Sungai Kolok district killed herself because she could not find money for the scheme.
Under Thaksin’s initiative, university students could also seek loans for their education regardless of their family’s financial status.
The tenure of the first government led by Thaksin lasted four years from 2001 to 2005. Dr Kasem Watanachai was the first education minister under the Thaksin-led government but tendered his resignation four months into the job. Word spread that Kasem, who was later appointed a privy councillor, was unhappy with a questionable reshuffle of teachers. So, Thaksin himself served as the education minister. However, after five months in the post, he named Suwit Khunkitti as new education minister. In the following years, Thaksin also appointed Pongpon Adireksarn and then Adisai Bodharamik as education ministers.
Such frequent changes, of course, raised questions as to whether the appointment of the education minister was more for political reasons.
When Thai Rak Thai was re-elected to power in 2005, Adisai received the education minister post but soon passed it on to Chaturon Chaisang.
Following the 2006 coup, Thaksin lost both his power and his influence over the country’s education policy.
However, when the People Power Party (PPP) won in 2007, it came up with populist education policies again. These policies focused on high-speed Internet for schools and teachers’ debt restructure. The PPP was a reincarnation of Thai Rak Thai.
When PPP leader Samak Sun-daravej was government leader, Somchai was education minister.
After Somchai replaced Samak as premier, he appointed Srimueang Charoensiri as education minister.
The Somchai-led administration stayed afloat for just a few months. From December 2009 to mid-2011, the Democrat Party headed the government and shaped the country’s education.
However, the Pheu Thai Party won by a landslide in 2011 and again installed Thaksin’s camp in power. Reminiscent of Thaksin’s promotion of populism, the Pheu Thai-led government announced a plan to hand out tablets to all students and revive the One District One Scholarship scheme.
Although these populist policies are attractive to voters, they do not touch the core of the country’s education. Just like previous administrations under Thaksin’s control, the Pheu Thai-led government has only highlighted and pushed for populist policies in the educational arena for its political gain.
Again, the government has no tangible education goals for the country to focus on and try to achieve. There is no specific timeframe and there is no implementation plan, either. Without a clear direction and vision, the country’s education has hardly gone anywhere during the past decade. If no change is made now, it will still be going nowhere in the future.