UNESCO Language, Guyana Reality: Promises Abroad Must Meet Conditions at Home

592 GUARDIAN♦ACCOUNTABILITY♦INTEGRITY IN JOURNALISM♦GUYANA

UNESCO Language, Guyana Reality: Promises Abroad Must Meet Conditions at Home

OPINION BY :Hem Kumar October 2026

Guyana’s representation at UNESCO should be an opportunity to speak honestly about both national ambition and national deficiency. The language of a more “effective,” “responsive,” “inclusive” and “people-centered” UNESCO is meaningful—but it also presents a standard against which Guyana’s own education system must be judged.

At international forums, it is easy to celebrate new schools, digital learning, teacher training, technical education and expanded access in hinterland and riverine communities. Those are worthy objectives. No serious observer would deny that Guyana needs more schools, better-trained teachers, stronger technical programs and greater access for children in remote communities.

But a country cannot credibly speak only of expansion while failing to confront the conditions under which many children and teachers are expected to learn and work.

Across Guyana, parents, teachers and communities have repeatedly raised concerns about deteriorating school buildings, unsafe structures, inadequate sanitary facilities, overcrowding, unfinished construction and maintenance failures. In some cases, schools or sections of schools have had to be closed or reclosed after opening because the buildings were not safe or suitable for occupancy.

That is not a minor administrative inconvenience. It is a profound failure of planning, supervision, procurement, inspection and accountability.

A school building is not merely a project for a ministerial press release. It is a daily environment for children. It must have sound roofs, safe electrical systems, clean water, working toilets, proper ventilation, secure classrooms, adequate furniture and facilities accessible to children with disabilities. It must be properly inspected before it is handed over, and it must be maintained after the cameras leave.

When a school opens with defects—or when it has to close shortly after an opening because of structural or safety concerns—the public is entitled to ask difficult questions. Who approved the work? Who certified that the building was ready? Were the contractors paid in full? Were defects identified before the opening? What action was taken against those responsible? And why are parents and teachers so often left to discover failures that should have been caught through routine professional oversight?

These questions are not an attack on Minister Sonia Parag personally. The issue is larger than any one minister, administration or ministry official. It is a recurring pattern in national governance: grand announcements, elaborate ceremonies, impressive targets—and then weak execution, unfinished works, poor maintenance and limited public accountability.

That pattern is especially troubling in education because children bear the consequences.

Inclusion Requires Safe Schools

Guyana’s message at UNESCO stresses inclusion and the principle that every child, regardless of geography or circumstance, should have access to quality education. That principle should be embraced. But access cannot mean merely assigning a child to a school or constructing a building in a community.

A child does not have meaningful access to quality education if the classroom is unsafe, the roof leaks, the toilets are unusable, the water supply is unreliable, or a construction project remains incomplete for months or years. A teacher cannot be expected to deliver quality instruction while managing basic failures of infrastructure that should have been resolved before the school term begins.

The conditions are often worse in remote and hinterland communities, where the state has an even greater responsibility to get things right. Communities that already contend with distance, transportation challenges, staffing shortages and limited services should not also be burdened with defective schools and incomplete works.

If Guyana is sincere about educational equality, it must establish that children in Regions One, Seven, Eight, Nine and other remote areas deserve the same standard of safety, sanitation and learning conditions as children anywhere else in the country.

Accountability Cannot Be Optional

UNESCO’s reform language—effectiveness, responsiveness, inclusion and impact—should not be treated as diplomatic vocabulary to be repeated abroad. It should become a governing test at home.

An effective education system completes projects on time and to specification.

A responsive education system acts quickly when parents, teachers and communities report unsafe or unsanitary conditions.

An inclusive education system ensures that children in poor, remote and Indigenous communities are not asked to accept facilities that would never be tolerated in Georgetown or in wealthier districts.

An accountable education system identifies who failed when public money is spent on defective buildings, incomplete works or facilities that cannot safely remain open.

That means Guyana needs more than announcements of construction. The Ministry of Education and relevant agencies should publish a national school-infrastructure register identifying every project, its contractor, contract sum, start date, planned completion date, actual completion date, sanitation; which are operating with unsafe buildings; and which projects have been delayed, abandoned or referred for investigation.

There should be no embarrassment in admitting deficiencies. The embarrassment lies in concealing them while proclaiming success.

Speak Truth at International Forums

The irony is that international forums such as UNESCO provide precisely the kind of platform on which Guyana can seek assistance, technical support, partnerships and solutions. They are not merely stages for polished national presentations.

Guyana could use UNESCO discussions to raise the real challenges confronting education: maintaining schools in remote areas; delivering water and sanitation infrastructure; retaining qualified teachers in the hinterland; closing the digital divide; safeguarding Indigenous languages and knowledge; improving disability access; and strengthening monitoring of school construction.

Such candor would not diminish Guyana. It would demonstrate maturity.

No country is expected to have solved every problem. But every country should be expected to describe its challenges honestly, identify what assistance it needs and show a credible plan for improvement. International co-operation is most valuable when it is rooted in truth—not when it is used to shield domestic failures behind flattering language.

Guyana should not go abroad to create the appearance of a flawless education transformation while parents and teachers at home continue to complain about unsafe buildings, poor sanitation, incomplete construction and basic neglect.

From Ceremony to Delivery

The real measure of educational progress is not the number of speeches delivered in Paris, nor the number of sod-turnings and ribbon-cuttings staged in Guyana. It is whether children enter safe, clean, properly equipped classrooms every day.

It is whether a teacher can teach without worrying about the physical condition of the school.It is whether parents can send their children to school with confidence that the building is safe, the toilets work, water is available and the facilities are fit for learning.

Minister Parag’s UNESCO intervention offers a useful standard. Guyana should now apply that standard to itself.

If education is to be inclusive, it must be safe. If it is to be effective, projects must be completed properly. If it is to be accountable, those responsible for failures must answer. And if Guyana wants to be taken seriously when it speaks of “education for all,” it must ensure that the reality facing children in classrooms across the country matches the promise being made on international platforms.