HARARE A youth empowerment organisation says Zimbabwe faces the bleak prospect of becoming a net importer of skilled manpower as administrative bungling continues to drive the once robust education sector into the doldrums. (Pictured: Crossing the b
Zimbabwes public education system was once highly rated and the envy of many across Africa but a decade of political crisis and acute recession left the education in disarray and without resources to maintain or develop infrastructure.
The economic crisis also inspired a severe brain drain that saw skilled professionals, among them teachers and other education workers fleeing Zimbabwe to go abroad where salaries and living conditions were better. Warning that Zimbabwe would soon have no brains to drain, the National Youth Development Trust (NYDT) said last week that the situation in the education sector was so dire that the country could find itself unable to churn out qualified personnel.
At the rate at which Zimbabwe’s education system is collapsing, brain drain will soon be a thing of the past. Not because Zimbabwe’s best brains will decide to stay home for the good of the country, but simply because there will be little or no brains to drain anymore, the group said. More than three million Zimbabweans or a quarter of the population have left their homeland to escape economic hardships since the countrys political crisis began in 2000.
Most of them have settled in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Botswana, Australia and the United States where some disregarded their areas of expertise to opt for blue-collar menial jobs in order to eke out a living. NYDT noted with concern the continued deterioration in the education system which has seen thousands of young Zimbabweans failing to get a decent education over the past five year and lately to even sit national examinations.
Zimbabwes once brilliant public education sector is in a shambles, with the government unsure how many teachers or pupils were in schools and without cash to revive the schools or pay teachers. Education Minister David Coltart conceded early this year that the countrys schools were derelict, with his ministry unable to establish how many teachers are in schools.
He said pleas to international donors for cash to pay teachers had not yielded much since the formation of the coalition government in February a situation that has triggered intermittent strikes by the countrys teachers. Job boycotts by public school teachers have become fashionable since 2008, forcing most students to put school on hold or transfer to private schools. Very little learning took place at public schools last year as teachers spent the better part of the year striking for more pay or sitting at home because could not afford bus fare to work on their meagre salaries.
As teachers left schools unattended and pupils to their own devices, hooliganism crept in and buildings at most schools were vandalised with doors removed and windowpanes broken. Consequently education has become a privilege for the economically stable, not a right for all, observed NYDT. Reports of children being forced out of class or to attend lessons facing the back wall of the classroom are but a few accounts of shocking but factual tales on how the situation has spiralled downwards.
The empowerment group warned of the serious danger of Zimbabwe running out of teachers unless drastic action is taken to improve incentives for teachers and improve conditions at tertiary institutions. Zimbabwe will very soon have a shortage of teachers if the profession continues to be shunned by trainees and professionals alike, it said.
The decay at the institutions of higher learning has seen many Zimbabwean students now opting to study at foreign universities, particularly in South Africa.
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