The Sunday News
Lovemore Dube, Sunday News Correspondent
WUHAMA ward councillor in Bulilima District has bemoaned the long distance school children in the area are made to walk to access education, calling on the Government to build more educational institutions.
Some children are reportedly forced to drop out of school as the nearest secondary school is more than 15 kilometres away.
Clr Elias Dube appealed to authorities and other stakeholders to pool resources and build a secondary school in the area.
There are three primary schools in the ward with the nearest secondary school, Phakama almost 15km away.
“We have high incidences of school dropouts. Pupils eventually find it hard to walk 15km to school daily,” said Clr Dube.
He said some girls were now being forced into early marriages after abandoning school.
“At times there are makeshift boarding places near the schools but there have been reports that some of the girls end up engaging in early sexual activities because there are no adults to control them. Education is the present and future. Our children also deserve a chance to go as far as they can.”
He also lamented the state of the road in the area, adding that operators were shunning the route because of bad roads.
“For a distance of less than 90km from Plumtree Town we are forking out over R100, much more for the 180km direct route via Tjefunye. Our community members cannot attend to emergencies on time. Even when there is free transport it takes over four to five hours to get to Plumtree, the roads are in a sorry state,” he said on the sidelines of a leadership, local governance and development, information technologies advocacy workshop run by Habbakuk Trust in the area on Thursday.
