All set for Rundu project school
RUNDU – Director of education in Kavango East Fanuel Kapapero says they are burning the midnight oil to ensure the unplaced grades eight, nine and 10 learners at Rundu get classes.
Despite the cumbersome procurement process, he said tents have been set up at the Rundu Trade Fair Centre, and only a few glitches need to be sorted out to get the makeshift school up and running.
This follows a situation on Thursday when desperate parents and their children went to the circuit office to demand answers as to why the education directorate has not yet set up the tents as promised.
In their anger, they threw stones at the office roofs, traumatising officials, who had to be rescued by the Namibian police.
“They thought officials are wasting time and doing nothing about their situation. They then started throwing stones at the roof of the circuit office, and that’s bad, but they were later calm after being addressed by the police. My colleagues also addressed them on how far we are in getting the learners into class,” he said.
Kapapero urged the aggrieved learners and parents to have faith in his administration, saying, “We are almost where we want to be; that promise that we gave at the gathering recently, we are almost there”.
He told New Era the number of unplaced learners, which initially stood at 1 090, has decreased, as some learners managed to get placement elsewhere in the region.
The director said they will this week register the remaining learners, who will be taught in tents while waiting for the construction of their classrooms at the project school.
The initial plan was to accommodate the learners in tents at various schools until the construction of the new school is completed, but the directorate later decided the learners will now be taught at the Rundu Trade Fair centre, where there are ablution facilities and security.
The directorate of education, through the regional council, has since run a tender advertisement for the construction of the envisaged Rundu project school.
“We got the tents, but as you may be aware, one cannot just put up a school without looking at security and sanitation, so we needed to look into these things, including the aspect of teachers and chairs as well as desks and so
many other small things that are crucial,” Kapapero noted.
The director stated the main problem is getting teachers.
“There’s no way that you just get a teacher and put them in
class. We received a budget to recruit about 35 teachers – but, of course, they won’t all be for this project school, as some are for other schools. But what we are doing now is transferring
some experienced teachers to the positions at the project school and then we will allow schools to recruit new teachers because we can’t start a school with only novice teachers.”
He said they have also brought in an experienced principal –and regarding the new posts, the ministry’s executive director last week consulted the Office of the Prime Minister to ask for permission to advertise positions only for one week so they can conduct interviews and appoint as soon as possible.
“We are actually busy just to ensure that all is well and the learners get to class. People might think we are taking too long or we are not doing anything but the challenge of government is that even if one needs to buy a pen, it will take a week, because everything that you do needs to go through a cumbersome procurement process. You need to put in a request that needs to be sent to be approved – and it takes time,” he said.