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Kabale primary school gets help in bid to lift it from ruins
Some of the classroom blocks at Mukokye Primary School in Maziba Sub-county, Kabale District. PHOTO/ROBERT MUHEREZA.
What you need to know:
- Some teachers walk about 20kms to the school every day.
A school in Kabale District has not had any of its pupils pass in Grade One for the last 20 years.
Mukokye Primary School, in Maziba Sub-county, which is about 2kms on the Ugandan border with Rwanda, was established by the government in 1980.
However, the school’s performance has partly been attributed to the poor learning and teaching environment.
Additionally, the school continues to suffer from glaring disadvantages emanating from limited manpower and infrastructure deficits.
Mr George Kamuhanda, the head teacher of Mukokye Primary School, on Monday revealed that government has paid less attention to the school as they have never been considered to benefit from the government’s facilitation grant or rehabilitation programme.
“We are struggling and operating in dilapidated buildings because the school has never received any facilitation grant from the government,” Mr Kamuhanda said.
When this reporter visited the school, he discovered that one of buildings is a temporary structure of mud and wattle while the other building is of half-baked bricks.
The Teachers lack accommodation while pupils struggle to access clean water.
“Some teachers walk about 20kms every day to come to the school. I ride my bicycle for about 30km daily to report to school. If we had modern classrooms and staff houses like other government primary schools, the teaching and learning process would be successful,” Mr Kamuhanda said.
The school is also inaccessible as its terrain and poor road network hinder the transportation of building materials, according to the school management.
Other issues
However, Mukokye Primary School boasts of an enrolment of 250 pupils, who are operating under difficult circumstances.
“Absenteeism among the Primary Six and Seven pupils is also high because parents want to engage them in garden work, especially during harvesting seasons. Other pupils in upper classes absent themselves because of the lucrative cross -border trade while others opt for casual employment where they are paid Shs7,000 per day,” Mr Kamuhanda revealed.
Ms Norah Twenda, the area district councillor, criticised government for failing respond to their plea of renovating the school.
She observed that three years ago when she engaged the Kabale district council, they opted to construct a modern VIP-latrine.
Helping hand
“At the beginning of last year, I wrote a proposal to attract partners that would help us in renovating this school. This is when Platinum credit Uganda answered our call” Ms Norah Twenda said.
On Saturday, the customer service manager at Platinum Credit Uganda, Mr Godfrey Wandera and the legal consultant of the same company, Mr Elvis Twenda, presided over the launch a Shs100m construction project that will see a three classroom block built.
The function was attended by the Kabale District inspector of schools, Mr Wilberforce Nabasa.
Mr Wandera said it was their corporate social responsibility to fund the construction of a three class room block and asked the parents and school administration to closely monitor the project to ensure value for money.
Mr Nabasa said they lack resources to rehabilitate Mukokya Primary school.
However, he appealed to parents to work as a team and construct staff houses and classrooms and that the district will provide roofing materials.
