Gov’t cuts $19m funding for Australia’s largest Islamic school

The federal government has revoked the $19 million funding for Sydney’s Malek Fahd Islamic School. Education Minister Simon Birmingham said Australia’s largest Islamic school was not spending money only on education.

Birmingham said the Department of Education issued a notice to revoke the school’s funding on Monday due to “non-compliance” with the Australian Education Act. The funding will stop from April 8.

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In November, Malek Fahd and five other schools affiliated with the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC) – Islamic College of Brisbane, Islamic College of Melbourne, Islamic College of South Australia, Islamic School of Canberra and Langford Islamic College in Western Australia – were accused of breaching the Education Act. There were concerns that AFIC had been mismanaging taxpayer funds.

Malek Fahd, which has several campuses, was not able to defend its use of funds and governance arrangements during the formal compliance review of their operations.

“We have very strong standards in place, which we expect of all schools in receipt of federal funding,” Birmingham was quoted by the ABC as saying. “Those standards require schools to operate on a not-for-profit basis, and to dedicate all funding received to the benefit, welfare and education advancement of the students to ensure that they are independent in their operations.

Birmingham stressed, “This should not be seen as a matter relating to Islamic schools; this is a matter relating to school governance.”

If Malek Fahd was to close because of lack of financial means to operate, the NSW Department of Education has considered contingency plans. Birmingham was confident that students would find places in local schools.

AFIC’s vice president in the Australian Capital Territory, Mohammad Berjaoui, insisted that all the money they receive go to education. He defended spending millions of dollars for land, which benefits hundreds of students.

“Probably the management, it has not been done to the satisfaction of the Commonwealth, we’ll look into it,” he promised. “But believe me, there is no embezzlement, there is no money paid for favours, the money which Malek Fahd school gets, it goes into education.”

He further explained that they had some people at Malek Fahd who were not capable of running the school. They have already fired those people and therefore, “things will get better very, very soon.”