Education Minister Anthony Garcia

The Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion says it will be work­ing with the po­lice to ensure all its con­struc­tion sites are prop­er­ly se­cure.

The an­nounce­ment of the new arrange­ment comes af­ter the dis­cov­ery of a mi­ni-mar­i­jua­na plan­ta­tion at the stalled con­struc­tion site of the Re­form

Hin­du Pri­ma­ry School.

Last Friday, par­ents who were protest­ing the delay in completing the construction of the school, en­tered the com­pound and found sev­er­al mari­jua­na plants.

It is reported they also found a makeshift bed, two chairs and a cloth­ing line in­side a class­room.

In an­oth­er class­room, they found a kitchen out­fit­ted with a stove and uten­sils.

Gas­par­il­lo po­lice were con­tact­ed and the re­spond­ing of­fi­cers up­root­ed the mar­i­jua­na plants.

The find prompt­ed crit­i­cism of the Min­istry’s de­lay in com­plet­ing the school.

In a me­dia re­lease, the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion yesterday said it has contin­ued its thrust to­wards se­cur­ing funds for the con­struc­tion of schools and the completion of others.

The Ministry said in the first phase of its con­struc­tion pro­gram, 27 schools have been iden­ti­fied as be­ing in ad­vanced stages of com­ple­tion.

Last month, the gov­ern­ment said it would go to the lo­cal mar­ket to raise the $900 mil­lion need­ed to com­plete the schools by 2020.

The Min­istry said it has not­ed that some par­ents were en­gaged in protests, call­ing for schools to be re­built or com­plet­ed.

How­ev­er, it said the Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion An­tho­ny Gar­cia had again ex­plained why the gov­ern­ment was at this junc­ture with school construction.

He said it is the con­sti­tu­tion­al right of every cit­i­zen of this coun­try to protest, but they must also know the facts.