The Office of the Basic Education Commission (Obec) has ordered a review of free lunch programmes for kindergarten and primary students at schools under their responsibility after allegations of corruption re-surfaced.
The move comes after the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) in Nakhon Ratchasima discovered that at least four schools in the province had supplied students with substandard lunches.
According to the NACC, school bosses spent only part of their school lunch budgets and could not explain where the rest of the money had gone. Some claimed they had not embezzled the remaining funds, but spent them on other student activities such as sport.
In some cases, the number of students registered for school lunch programmes were found to be higher than the number of students enrolled in school, suggesting student numbers were concocted so the school could get more money.
The findings are another blow to the credibility of the state-run school lunch programme. Since 1999, when it started, the Ministry of Education has provided 20 baht per pupil per day for students from preschool to elementary school levels.
Each school is empowered to hire private caterers to provide the lunches for its students.
Yet there have been reports of fraud at some schools, which have been accused of not allocating the full amount for meals and misusing or siphoning off the rest.
Last week, Obec transferred the director of Maheyong School in Nakhon Si Thammarat province to an inactive post pending an investigation, after a video clip went viral this month showing a student with only rice, a soup containing vegetable scraps and watermelon for lunch.
