The cabinet has today decided to expand the National Fund for Higher Education and Training.
They took the decision after discussing a paper presented by the Ministry of Human Resources, Youth and Sports on the issue.
Cabinet members highlighted that as the government expands the Fund, to make it sustainable, an important step was to bring onboard other parties to take share in the Fund.
After determining the amount of money that could be contributed to the Fund by the government, the cabinet decided to open the Fund for private sector contribution.
As a public-private Fund, the private parties that contribute to the Fund will be represented in the Board of Trustees.
Ministry of Finance and Treasury will immediately allocate Rf 5 million to the Fund.
The money will be used mainly to alleviate the difficulties that self-financing students are facing.
A ministerial committee was also appointed to study further measures that could be taken to broaden the Fund. The committee include Minister of Human Resources, Youth and Sports, Hassan Latheef; Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture, Dr Ahmed Ali Sawad; Minister of Education, Dr Musthafa Luthfy; and, Minister of Home Affairs Mohamed Shihab.
At today’s meeting, the cabinet also discussed the issue of the fees and deposits given by the expatriate workers in the Maldives.
The Cabinet decided to make, a complete audit of the bank account in which the money were deposited.
It cabinet also decided to place the account under the care of the Ministry of Finance and Treasury and to send to the Maldives Police Service, for investigation, any illegal activity with regard to the discussed account.
Further, it was decided that the Department of Immigration and Emigration would use the account, after making a request at the Ministry of Finance and Treasury, in cases where an expatriate labourer need to be deported.
The cabinet also decided to hold a stakeholders conference on the issues concerned with expatriate labourers.
