Call to contribute to schools

GWANDA South Constituency Member of Parliament, Omphile Marupi, wants communities to contribute by building cottages at schools in a bid to attract teachers.

The project can be made easier if members of the community contribute resources like river sand, bricks, pit sand, water and labour, while the rural district council and the MP channel devolution funds towards the construction of schools.

“Some schools do not have enough accommodation, hence as communities let us join hands and build teachers’ cottages to accommodate enough teachers assigned to our schools,” said Marupi.

The non-availability of enough school infrastructure has a negative bearing as it is not attractive to new teachers in Gwanda South and the province.

Besides, this has led to poor results in both primary and secondary schools. Matabeleland South’s pass rate is always low because qualified teachers are shunning these schools due to a plethora of reasons, among them poor infrastructure.

However, the worst affected schools are satellite schools in Resettlement areas, where pupils are using old farm houses and nearby trees as classrooms.

While the land reform programme was a distributive justice scheme it created, in its wake, inequitable access to education.