Dokora grilled in Parliament over From One enrolment

*THE HON. SPEAKER:  Order, order.  I think the Minister has articulated very well on that one – [HON. MEMBERS:  Inaudible interjections.] – Hon. Muderedzwa, order!

*HON. M. S. MUCHENJE:  My question is directed to the Minister of Primary and Secondary Education, Hon. Dr. Dokora.  When Form One students are being registered, there is a challenge that parents are being urged to pay for school fees and uniforms.  Those who have passed are the ones who get places.  Some of the children who have passed cannot get places because they do not have money.  Schools are now selling uniforms.

*HON. DR. DOKORA:  Thank you Mr. Speaker.  Let me enlighten the House that as we sit down as a family, that our child now has to go for boarding, it is not an easy thing.  This is because the child is now leaving the control of the parent and he/she is going to be a boarder under the control of the school.  So, what schools look at is that all the children are in boarding and should be more or less the same so that their status would not differentiate them.  Therefore, if a child is at boarding and does not have a uniform, he/she will be stigmatized as they will not be the same as other children.  It is a plea to you Hon. Members that you should understand that if a child is going to a boarding school, there are some implications.  This means we have to pay the levy fees and money for school uniforms because we do not want them to be different from other children.  In education we would say you have affected the concentration of the child.

*HON. M. S. MUCHENJE:  My supplementary question is that, parents are looking for places and schools are demanding money for uniforms.  At the banks, there is no cash so parents have to transfer school fees.  Many people have not been paid yet. What we want to know is, can we go and tell parents that it is Government policy that if you are looking for a boarding place for your child you should have money ready before Christmas.  Is this a new policy?

*HON. DR. DOKORA:  Thank you Mr. Speaker.  There is no new policy that has been introduced that children should have their fees and uniforms paid for.  All schools that offer boarding places have their own requirements.  So for me to stand here and say they should let the children not to pay for the uniforms, what I would have done is just to stigmatise your child. Thank you.

+HON. P. D. SIBANDA:  Has it become the Ministry’s policy to introduce new and far-reaching measures into the education sector without having widely consulted the public?

*THE MINISTER OF PRIMARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION (HON. DR. DOKORA):  I want to thank the Acting President who interpreted what the Hon. Member has said.  I believe that with what we have been working on and the things that we have been moving with are things that are very important and we know that that is the way forward in the area of education.  I think we have gone a long way, when we talked even with the Committee, giving us reports, that is where we get these policies.  We get good facts from there and that will help us in developing our policies.  This House is not surprised that the challenges that we were faced with were very big.  So, those challenges are the ones that we are trying to solve so that we implement the online and manual.

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