Government has unveiled plans to scrap its much treasured Universal Secondary Education partnership with private schools in the country.

Addressing a news conference at Parliament, government chief whip Justine Kasule Lumumba said the withdrawal of partnership will be done in phases beginning next financial year.

She argues that government has been spending about shs50b annually in the partnership, yet the same money can be used for construction of own private schools in about 200 sub-counties each year.

She however says the current beneficiaries of the USE programme will continue in their schools but government will only maintain partnership with a few private schools in sub-counties where government does not have any secondary school from next year.

Government has been in partnership with private schools across the country to extend free secondary education since 2007 when Uganda became the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to introduce universal secondary education, 10 years after it introduced universal primary education.