HARARE A leading human rights group has expressed concern at what it described as the governments deplorable failure to prevent violation of childrens right to education by school authorities and police that have been barring pupils from class over non-payment of fees.
The Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) that said it was prepared to take legal action in defense of childrens right to education called on Education Minister David Coltart to act urgently to stop school administrators, the parents controlled-School Development Associations (SDAs) and the police from interfering with childrens schooling. ZLHR calls on the Ministry of Education .. to ensure that SDAs, police, and all other retrogressive elements which have no authority to interfere with schooling, desist from directly or indirectly interfering with the right to education of all children, the group said.
The Ministry must urgently put into place concrete measures to ensure that all children are allowed to continue to attend classes even in instances where they have not yet paid fees.
Coltart was not immediately available for comment on the matter. According press reports last week, several public schools heads working their SDAs had hired the police to help prevent children whose parents failed to pay schools fees from attending class. This is in clear violation of government regulations that children cannot be barred from class over non-payment of fees which is the responsibility of their parent.
The ZLHR said what was most disturbing was the fact that police had been drafted at some schools to help keep pupils whose parents failed to fees out of class. The lawyers group said: What is extremely disturbing is the report that the police were called in to certain schools . the (police) are well-known for their heavy-handed and often unprocedural and unlawful actions. (The police) have been known in the past to have used excessive and unjustifiable force on innocent citizens who are seeking to peacefully advance their basic fundamental human rights. They have no place in schools or anywhere near innocent children whose peace of mind and security has already been disrupted by arbitrary action to prevent them from attending classes.
While parents have been grateful to the unity government for managing to re-open schools when it came into office in 2009, many families complain that fees are too high especially as most parents are yet to get back jobs they lost during past years of recession. Zimbabwes education sector once regarded as an example to the rest of Africa is a pale shadow of its former self after the unprecedented political and economic crisis of the past decade drove away the countrys best trained teachers and academics to foreign lands where pay and living conditions were better. The economy from which the country is only beginning to emerge now also meant that was unable to raise cash to build new schools or maintain existing ones.
Post published in: News