Sunday Mail

6 February 2011

By Tendayi Regis Mutokonyi

We live in a world of magicians or illusionists, people who create scenarios that fool the mind.

Some of them practise their trade for purposes of entertainment, like the great acts of the American illusionist Harry Houdini, or film director Steven Spielberg.

These acts are essentially facades. In the case of the above-mentioned duo, their acts are regarded as entertainment.

However, not all such acts are performed for purposes of entertainment. Some, if not most, are conducted in deceit for some sort of gain.

Without knowing it, we witness these acts in the form of supernatural miracles, medicinal cures, even investment packages.

In fact, the ongoing global financial crisis owes its birth to such acts. But if really come to think of it, anything can be a facade.

Courtship for marriage could be regarded as such an act. That is why some cultures have done away with it completely and opted for arranged marriages as is the case in some Asian and African customs.

In some Shona dialects, to court someone for purposes of marriage is known as kunyenga while to deceive or con is known as “kunyengedza”. The two share a root. I am not well versed in the dynamic links of culture and language, but I would assume that this group of the Shona people that use this dialect perhaps adopted the custom of arranged marriages.

The best place to find such information is from the ministry of Native Affairs, oh sorry, I mean the Ministry of Education, Arts, Sport and Culture, headed by Senator David Coltart, “Gurukota reDzidzo, Tsika neMagariro Evanhu veZimbabwe”.

I think it is high time we stopped all this smart talk under the guise of progressive thinking and call a spade a spade.

A rainbow is a spectrum of colours produced from the refraction of white light. There is no black in that equation.

So, why do people talk of a “rainbow nation”? I think it is a misplaced metaphor to describe a multi-racial society, especially one that is predominantly considered black.

We conveniently hear of reconciliation when it is the Honourable Prime Minister Ian Smith or Botha facing the noose, while Saddam hangs.

We hear of “blood diamonds” but do not hear of “blood weapons” and never stop to question why. It is not a racial argument, although racism can be part of this equation, not at all, it is about ideology (philosophy), people and, ultimately, wealth.

When a desired ideology is methodically imparted on a population through the various vehicles, like religion and education, it manifests itself in a desired culture, in our case, a culture that is blind to discrepancies, therefore, creating the greatest illusion, where men call other men god.

That is why I am not surprised that Gurukota reDzidzo, Tsika neMagariro Evanhu veZimbabwe riri VaDavid Coltart is said to have ordered school books with a questionable doctrine.

The majority of us do not question, in the same way we do not question why the great Cecil John Rhodes chose to be buried at the Matopos.

The boy almost literally owned this country. He could have been buried at Great Zimbabwe or even in Victoria Falls.

But no, it had to be the Matopos, the most sacred place to the black people, from where our prophets and spirit mediums communicated with God, and we do not question.

It is tantamount to burying Mbuya Nehanda at St Peter’s Square at the Vatican.

Some will say I am being paranoid with historical trivialities, or I am a frustrated racist, but when some people have been for decades shipping diamonds out of my country on the pretext of collecting “stones for fish ponds”, while my fellow Africans despised the stones for eroding their hoes, it makes me question.

It is all about doctrine and the custodians of it. John 1:1 says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

What did King Solomon ask for and was given, but with it came much more than he had asked for? It was a doctrine by which to govern; so enticing was his “Word” given unto him by God that according to the third Book of Kings, all peoples of all kings of the earth came to hear his wisdom, and with this wisdom came great wealth.

If you have the Word like King Solomon, you have the world, you are a god, that is why to this day we call people of European descent “mulungu”, Swahili and Nyanja for God, and we are not perplexed.

God created all men equal, with equal opportunity to wisdom (the Word) and wealth, but some men decided to make themselves unequal by prescribing to the “word” of others, thereby making themselves subservient.

That is why the injustices perpetrated against them go unnoticed because they are not the custodians of the word that makes them see the injustice.

In simple terms, there are many laws today that are in direct conflict with our culture (modern and traditional), that hinder and constrain us, but we cannot challenge these laws from our African perspective because we have been socialised to believe that it would be backward or retrogressive to do so.

If we subscribed to our own doctrines we would be masters of our world like King Solomon, smile all the way to the bank, like the Chinese, Indians, Japanese, and other emancipated peoples.

There is one common denominator among all Third World countries, and that is their adherence to foreign doctrines.

The facade of David Coltart at the helm of the ministry that deals with imparting dogma to our children is neo-imperialism at its best; it is an insult. Minister Priscilla Misihairabwi-Mushonga would have been a better facade for that post and the Honorable Senator with his BLL best suited with her ministry.

There is a reason why expatriates do not teach young children in the United Kingdom. It is the preserve of the “Spencers”; it is not a racial argument; it is about the hand that rocks the cradle, it is about heritage.

trmutokonyi@yahoo.com.

Foundationforfarming.org

3 February 2011

By Brian Oldreive

Peter Goosen was gifted in many ways, and did many things. His largest contribution was to the mining industry, but I want to remember today the wonderful way in which he brought God’s grace to farming in Zimbabwe and to many other nations.

Peter served on the national committee of ‘Farmers for Jesus’ for many years, and I remember his passion for evangelising the workers on the farms in our nation. This also involved sharing the Gospel with the farmers themselves, and Peter had a wonderful way of sharing his testimony with clarity and boldness.

Peter also diligently served ‘Farming God’s Way’, which has been the model that the Lord has given us primarily to feed the hungry and to set them free from captivity to poverty by teaching them to feed themselves in a sustainable and godly way. In all this Peter and Nan were totally united in their fervour for the vision and in their love for the poor.

Peter and Nan remained faithful to the quest when the Lord asked us to change the name to Foundations for Farming when God showed us that Godly Farming was to be a foundational platform for the rebuilding of our nation. Peter travelled widely in Zimbabwe and South Africa putting in many Well Watered Gardens. I remember putting in a model with Peter at Petra High School, which began the process through Jenny Coltart, to her husband David, who then a few years later, as Minister of Education, invited us to take Foundations for Farming into all the schools in Zimbabwe.

Many years ago we asked Angus Buchan to come up and speak at our annual Farmers for Jesus Convocation, and Angus watched us put in a Well Watered Garden on the Bulawayo Race Course in front of the main grandstand. This began a remarkable friendship between Angus and Peter, which resulted in Peter becoming Angus’s faithful armour bearer. Peter often went before Angus into many nations to prepare the way for Angus to follow and preach. Peter would then accompany Angus as a great support for him, and Peter would faithfully share the Farming God’s Way vision with every one he met on these trips. This has resulted in Peter and Nan’s deep friendship with Pastor Jason James, who together with Shane Ivers, have recently asked us to officially launch Foundations for Farming into Australia at the end of March this year. Peter’s friendship with Angus has also contributed towards the huge call we are now receiving to take Foundations for Farming into South Africa.

Apart from Peter’s service to agriculture, he has left a wonderful example of Christian manliness to our younger men. His deep love and commitment to Jesus shone through in his humble dignity, and he seemed to be a man who knew what God wanted him to do. Peter was a very faithful friend to so many of us.

Finally I want to make mention of how magnificently Kim represented her mum and sisters to Pete in the time he was up in Harare. Pete and Nan would have been very proud of her, as they were of the remarkable family they have left behind. 

Brian Oldreive
Foundations for Farming founder
www.foundationsforfarming.org

Financial Gazette

3 February 2011

The Financial Gazette’s Political Editor, Clemence Manyukwe (CM), had a conversation with Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) president, Welshman Ncube (WN), on the ongoing saga regarding his party’s decision to recall Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) Arthur Mutambara. Below are excerpts of the interview in which Ncube also offered his views on the recently formed Mthwakazi Liberation Front, among other issues:

CM: Since when have you harboured ambitions to occupy this top party post?

WN: I am not sure whether one talks of ambition to occupy any position as the appropriate nomenclature. I think what is important is to recognise that if you have worked in any organisation for a long time and if you are called upon by your party members to assume a certain position of leadership and when you have repeatedly declined, you get to a point where you feel that you have been through all the learning curves, that you understand the national political dynamics better and that you have acquired sufficient experience to accept the leadership challenge at the highest level.

You think, look, not only have I acquired a lot of experience, but in the process, I have developed a vision of where you like to see your country in 20-30 years and looking around you, you realise that you have the capacity, the knowledge; you have the vision to make your country a better place for its citizens.

You say, look, maybe you can play a role in ensuring that, as a country, we can stop looking to the past in order to justify the present and explain why we cant have a better future. You don’t believe that after 30 years, President (Robert) Mugabe can take us to the promised land, you do not believe that the MDC-T can take us there.

We believe we are the leaders with the capacity, the skills to take us there. It is not about ambition. One is answering a calling because you think you can do it.

CM: Since taking over from Mutambara as the leader of the MDC, what are the immediate changes you have effected in the party?

WN: We do not think it’s a question of effecting change for the sake of being different. It is about ensuring that the party is properly organised, membership and leadership is properly motivated.

What we have been doing and what we are doing is that you stay in constant touch with the party leadership and membership in order to keep them motivated in our efforts to rebuild our party through recruiting new members and ensuring our structures are strong in every part of the country. Ever since congress, we have not had one moment’s rest.

CM: What do you consider as DPM Mutambara’s greatest blunder and greatest success during his time as MDC president?

WN: I am not aware of any great blunders that he made. What I am aware of is: He was our president at a time when the obituaries of our party were being written, in particular, during the aftermath of the 2008 elections.

The fact that as president of the party he led us to where we are today — even our most ardent enemies accept that we did not die and certainly we were never buried and that, as a party, we are much more visible today, much clearer of where we want to take this country . . . he held us together throughout the dark, doubtful days. In government, he led us notwithstanding our small numbers in Cabinet, to a performance which equalled those who have three, four times more people in Cabinet than us. In my view, this is not a mean achievement.

CM: Any comment to criticisms that the majority of your party members who lost in the 2008 general polls are the ones occupying influential government positions as opposed to those who were elected to Parliament?

WN: That criticism comes from our opponents and enemies. We know we put forward into government the best team that we could master from among our ranks, the most capable, the talented, the most hardworking. We had a task 10 times than that of other members in the coalition.

We, therefore, chose to project the best strength we had in the party; that is why so many of our opponents were offended. We certainly believe that we have a healthy mix between our elected leaders and the non-elected. David Coltart, Moses Mzila, Tapela, Makhuda and we mixed that with the three who did not get directly elected — Mutambara, (Priscilla) Misihairabwi-Mushonga and myself.

CM: Since there is a recommendation for you to take over Professor Mutambara’s position as DPM, some people wonder why the party could not deploy Prof Mutambara to your current portfolio as the Industry and Commerce Minister, instead of the regional affairs one.

WN: The prerogative of deploying party cadres to government is that of the standing committee of the party. The standing committee is aware of the strengths and weaknesses of each of one of us. These strengths and weaknesses were considered and the 24 members of the standing committee felt that the skills and talents that Prof Mutambara has will be best suited for the job.

Minister Misihairabwi-Mushon-ga’s talents were better suited working with the local business community. That was the judgment of the standing committee and I, as president of the party, respects that collective opinion.

CM: Since your party recalled DPM Mutambara, have you spoken to him to get his views regarding his possible stepping down from that post?

WN: Firstly, yes, I spoke to Prof Mutambara during and after the meeting of the standing committee. He expressed his views which he wanted communicated to the standing committee, which I did and equally the standing committee wanted me to communicate to him its collective opinion and decision, again which I did.

Having done that, we await Prof Mutambara’s official opinion on the decision of the standing committee. Here, we must always understand that loyal party cadres obey the instructions of the party when they are given.

Finally, let me say that in our view as a party, it’s never about an individual stepping down from this or that post, it’s always about accepting the deployment, the command or the instruction of the party.

CM: What did the DPM request you to communicate to the standing committee?

WN: Obviously, I am not at liberty to disclose the contents of a private conversation. It would be unprofessional to do so.

CM: What is your comment on President Mugabe’s stance that there are legal complications on Mutambara’s recalling and only him will make a decision on whether or not to step down?

WN: The first point is that I will not speak to President Mugabe through the media. I am yet to hold a meeting with him to convey the position of my party. Until such time that I have had that conversation with him, it will be improper for me to comment on a matter that I have not yet presented to him.

CM: What if you communicate with him and he maintains his present stance?

WN: We do not believe he can have any official position before he has heard us. If you were a lawyer, you would understand that. A judge cannot make a determination before the case has been formally placed and argued before him. The President must hear our case first. We will not therefore engage in any speculative debate. We cannot cross the bridge we have not arrived at.

CM: Should Mutambara opt not to resign, would he be representing your party in meetings with the other principals?

WN: The foundation of your question is problematic. We do not believe that Professor Mutambara has to opt to resign. All that is required of him is not resigning, but accepting deployment.

CM: What if he declines the redeployment?

WN: Again, I refrain from crossing bridges I have not arrived at.

CM: Divisions have emerged since your congress, how do you intend to manage the crisis?

WN: We do not believe there is a crisis. There is a group of half a dozen people out of 4 500 delegates who were entitled to attend a congress. Out of the 4 500 people, we have a dozen people who are unhappy with the outcome. And they are unhappy because congress refused to re-elect them.

Surely, can we say there is a crisis? Remember, these are 12 people who failed to get any nomination from the party structures. I do not believe it constitutes a crisis.

CM: Whom do you think is funding the so-called MDC renegades?

WN: I do not know, but all I know is that virtually all of these individuals — during the last five years in the party, where unable to raise bus fare for themselves. They certainly cannot afford legal fees in this country — that is obvious.

The only clue that you might have as to who maybe funding them is the choice of their lawyers (Mbizo, Muchadehama & Makoni law firm). That may give us a clue or it might be a coincidence. If it is a coincidence, it’s a curious coincidence. The lawyers representing them are the same lawyers to one of the two parties in the inclusive government.

CM: Any chance of your party maintaining or exceeding the number of seats you have in Parliament or better still taking over power in the next elections?

WN: We have no doubt that we are the party to vote for in the next elections and therefore, that we will do better than we did in the 2008 elections, is a foregone conclusion.

CM: What is your view on the recently formed party Mthwakazi Liberation Front and its agenda of secession of Matabeleland provin-ces?

WN: We are a democratic country. Every group is free to form such political party as they believe will represent their interests. We are not privy to the ideological underpinnings of this new party. I do not know what they stand for. Let them place themselves before the people for judgment at the next election.

CM: What is your personal view on the issue of secession?

WN: We believe in Zimbabwe as one indivisible whole and that Zimbabwe is one country for all: Zimbabweans who are equal before God and before themselves and who have and should have equal political rights and opportunities.

If you can achieve this, Zimbabwe, where all of us, regardless of places of origin are treated fairly and justly and equally, there would be no foundation for secession arguments.

ICT in Education Speech

By Senator David Coltart

3 February 2011

Please note that this is an unedited transcript of the speech.

Ladies and Gentlemen good morning to you all. I apologise for arriving a bit late for your meeting. I have come from what many Harare people think of as a small little village out of town called Bulawayo and our traffic isn’t quite as much as yours in Harare so I was using Bulawayo time to get here and got caught up, my apologies.

Ladies and gentleman this workshop is a very important workshop because information technology in computers is very close to my heart and also is an absolutely key issue which we have to confront if we are to transform our educations sector and provide the foundation our nations needs through it too bring Zimbabwe into the status it deserves to be of being the jewel of Africa.

I left school quite a long time ago now, I left school in 1975, and when I left school in 1975, although I went to what I consider to be a very good school, a catholic brothers school in Bulawayo, there wasn’t a single computer in my school. Even when I went to university computers were a novelty. Infact the first computer that I ever had or interacted with was a little Amstrad. Some of you have probably never heard of that because I see that many of you are much younger but I do see some grey heads like me. But going right the way back to 1986 which was when I got my first computer – this   little Amstrad, – and I remember it proudly noting it could save a whole 2 pages of data! I could type a personal letter, I remember writing a Christmas letter to friends, and my whole letter could be saved and edited. And I thought that this was absolutely marvellous. Just last week I took delivery of a computer for my own office which can literally store every single book that has ever been published. That is the reality and that is where computers have gone just, not even in my lifetime just in my professional lifetime. You can imagine then my deep concern when I discovered when I took over this job that the last time our education curriculum was comprehensively reviewed was the same time I bought that Amstrad, in other words in the mid 1980s. If we think of what has happened to computer technology since the 1980s this explosion of personal computers, the enormous power that computers provide modern society, you will see how far behind our education curriculum has lagged. It is a fact that our education system remains one of the finest in Africa. That is in general terms and it is seen in our high literacy rates and the fact that universities not just in Zimbabwe but elsewhere in the world seek the students coming through our schools because they are of a consistently high standard. But despite that the reality is that the teachers of information technology and our integration of information technology and computers into our broader curriculum and in the teaching of all subjects remain relatively speaking in the dark ages. Because we have not looked at our curriculum for over 20 years to see how information technology should be taught and how it integrates or how it should integrate into the teaching of all subjects, maths, science, chemistry, you name it. And likewise whilst information technology is taught in many schools, the harsh reality is that in most of our primary schools there is not a single computer. In most of our primary schools information technology is not taught and when you see what is happening in South Korea and Singapore and Finland the countries that have the finest education systems you will see that at the earliest possible age children are being introduced to computers in those countries, so by the time a child gets to the age of 6 or 7 they know a keyboard and that provides the foundation necessary for the teaching of not just information technology but of all subjects. And sadly the reality in our nation is that in present a tiny fraction of children have even an opportunity to touch and use a computer, never mind understand how it works prior to leaving school. And for so long as that remains the case our nation will be doomed to 2nd or 3rd class nation status. If we have a vision for our country as being a leader in Africa and a leader in the world, then it is critically important that we get this aspect of our education system right. If follows of course that just as there aren’t very few computers in our classrooms if follows that very few of our subjects are taught using computer technology. It has not been complied with the teaching of maths and technology. And I will speak just now about a conference I went to just 2 weeks ago when for the first time I was shown Apples application technology. It’s a whole new world out there located on the cloud that is there for free, that can draw out these amazing teaching techniques that are available for teachers and  it can be drawn down from the cloud and applied, and it is magical. I was always hopeless a maths and chemistry my strength was always in the arts, but in just a few minutes as I was shown I learnt things that I haven’t learnt in 10 years at school about maths and science because the subject was just brought alive through the use of these applications. That ladies and gentleman is the future, and if we don’t grasp that future our nation is going to be left behind.

So what are our plans within the ministry? Well I’m going to outline 4 broad plans that I am promoting within the ministry. The first deals not so much with the teaching of I.T but of laying the foundation necessary for I.T. when I took over this job almost 2 years ago, on the first day when I walked into my office I found that there wasn’t even a computer in my office, in the Minister’s office. There was no internet in the minister of education’s office. I’ve since rectified that, but there are major structural problems within the ministry. As you know the ministries head office is at Ambassador House it’s an 18 storey building, 4 of those floors are devoted to administration. If you go to those administration floors you will find a very dedicated bunch of administrator ploughing through literally mountains of paper. We have 4 floors of paper in that building, with hardly any functional computers with no computerised system, no data capture computerised system, and we are back in the dark ages. We have random computers individuals have their own personal computers, but there is no network and no EMIS (education management information system) in the ministry. And as a result in the ministry we have very inaccurate data. We don’t know in any precision how many teachers we’ve got, how many children are in our schools, how many children have dropped out, what their ages are. Yes we do have data in paper, but we do not have the means to analyse the data that we need to plan. As a result the very first thing that I am setting out to do is to rectify that. We are in discussions with UNICEF and UNESCA, and through the education transition fund I am pleased to tell you that we have recently agreed that we will be bringing in consultants to assess our needs, and we have a plan of action to network the head office, to transform that administration block to implement an EMIS system and then to have a progressive program to network first of all prevention education directors in the 10 provinces, and then district offices and then ultimately schools. But until we actually do that until we lay that foundation, it is going to be very difficult to roll out an education programme in I.T because our planning in itself is efficient because we have inaccurate data. So I hope that in the course of this year we will get at least the head office computerised. You will appreciate that it is not just about networking, if we don’t have administrators that understand computers, who are responsible for the planning of our curriculum, the planning of our education system, it’s going to be very difficult to roll out an educations system that truly embraces information technology, that understand what is needed to insure that teachers are adequately trained in the use of computers. And so this is why this first point if absolutely pivotal.

The second strategy is to embark on comprehensive curriculum review. For the first 18 months I spent a considerable amount of time seeking to understand the problems in the educsation sector, and seeking to build a consensus. By the end of July last year we built a consensus with all sectors of society, with all the sectors in the education system with the World Bank, with UNICEF and of course with government. And on the 7th of September last year I presented to cabinet a 5 point strategic plan to stabilise the education sector and to take it forward. A third of those strategic interventions is to embark on comprehensive curriculum review. And of course pivotal to curriculum review is the role that information technology will play within that. Some of you may know that in Mount Pleasant there is an education training centre in the curriculum development unit. 20 years ago that was a state of the art facility. It had computers in it, that where advanced for that time, it has 2 broadcasting studios, it has a television broadcasting studio, and 20 years ago it was used to develop education materials that were then used country wide. It had an entire artistic section and of course radio was used very effectively especially for rural schools to compliment the activities of teachers in rural schools using radio. Sadly in the last 10 years that entire system has become defunct, and when you visit it now it’s a bit like visiting a museum because you reel to reel tapes, there is hardly a single computer working in that entire building, and a key intervention which I have now managed to raise money for, is to completely rehabilitate that education training centre and the curriculum development unit in Mount Pleasant. We have to get in 39 key members of staff, who are going to start working on curriculum review, not just regarding I.T, but regarding every subject and they know that part of that process is going to be the integration of information technology into the teacher of every single subject. In the course of the last few months I have also been in discussions with Apple computers to use their technology to completely rehabilitate that sector. Now some of you who may be windows orientated may say well why are you going for Apple? And the reason we are going for Apple is because only Apple at this juncture has the technology that we need to take this programme under action from the curriculum development unit into every school, especially rural schools in our country, simply through the use of podcast technology and the use of iPods and hopefully in the future iPad. It is only Apple that has that technology at present.

What is our plan of action in this regard? Well our plan of action first of all is to rehabilitate the ETC and the curriculum development unit, to get it networked, to get those teachers in connected to the internet so that they are in the development of our curriculum, our new curriculum, have access to the cloud and to all these resources that are out there so that as they develop our new curriculum they can use the most advanced materials in the world to ensure that when we teach maths when we teach science when we teach chemistry, our curriculum will infact be right up there with the most advanced in the world. What we also intend doing is rehabilitating the broadcasting unit and the television studio. We intend taking technology and starting off with pilot schools. My intention is to try to progressively get computers especially into rural schools. Let me dream a bit with you for a moment. The ETC  centre the CDU centre in Mount Pleasant will be the centre where we develop our own computer based applications using visual aids, using this technology that the rest of the world is developing. So let’s take, for example, the teaching of Maths. To teach maths in a fun way, using visual aids, to put that into computer programmes that are Zimbabwean developed by our own teachers. Then to develop systematically a programme whereby schools in rural areas will have at the very least an iPod with the projector with solar power. So that in even your most remote school, every school will have at least once a week or ideally once a day, an opportunity to come into that computer class room and even if every child won’t have access to a computer, at the very least they will be able to see and learn about these subjects using iPods being projected onto the screen using solar technology. Now all of you know your average rural primary school, you know that in many schools there is an absolutely birth of resources and you go into these schools that have bare class rooms. Those are the schools I have in mind, that why I say we have to dream. And then my hope is that we can progressively, as funding becomes available, expand, not just the number of schools that have access to that technology, but also the number of computers that we put into schools, with a 5 year goal, and a 10 year goal and a 15 year goal. And I believe that if we get the economy functioning in this country it is not unrealistic to have a 10 year goal where every single class, in every single school in our nation has a computer and a projector and solar power so that children even in the most remote school where there is no cell phone contact and no access to the internet will at least every term get a package with the latest computer based teaching aids for use in that school. So what is our long term vision. But we have to make a start and the start will be made In Mount Pleasant by bringing in these teachers and the top teachers with the best attitude towards computer technology, and then to develop the broadcasting unit and the video unit that will produce these materials which will then be used in our schools countrywide. Of course in the short term we will also use Podcast technology in conjunction with the ZBC to resuscitate the use of radio and television but of course we know that has its limitations in schools because especially in rural schools whilst they can get radio, they do not have access to television. And as we all know some of the most important teaching aids are visual and that is what we have to aim for.

The third key intervention area relates to the I.T curriculum itself and developing a programme of action for the teaching of I.T in our schools. My concern is that there has not been a well thought through programme of action in this regard, sometimes the supply of hardware and software has been random. We have had incidences where computers have been delivered to schools and there is no electricity in those schools. Or teachers themselves don’t understand how to use the computers. So whilst it makes a good front page headline, ‘The Computers have been delivered to schools’, in practical terms is doesn’t have a profound impact in the teaching of I.T in those schools. And so a key part of the general process of curriculum review has to be a close study on how we actually teach I.T in our schools and a progressive plan of action to roll out computers into schools and to ensure the teachers themselves are used to that. And for those who are windows based, and P.C based, that is where the sales of those computers of course will come in because in terms of the pricing between MAC and PC. MACs are obviously exceptionally expensive compared to PCs, and I see MAC technology being used in this relatively narrow area of using applications, whereas PCs will be used more in the teaching of I.T because they are that must cheaper and can be rolled out easier to more schools.

The 4th key area relates to the training of teachers themselves,. Now as you know the training of new teachers is done by a completely separate ministry to mine, by the Ministry of Higher Education and whilst there is a close interaction, of course I don’t have the same influence over the training of new teachers as I do in the re-training of existing teachers. So our strategy is 2 fold in that regard. We have to have a close interaction with the ministry of Higher Education, to ensure that as we roll out these other programmes; new teachers are going to be taught effectively in the use of computers and in teaching the new curriculum that we intend rolling out. But the second aspect to this is in the re-training of the 110,000 teachers we already have in our system. That is absolutely critical, that is where the education training centre in Mount Pleasant comes into play again. There is an entire facility that was set up there 25 years ago that is not being used by the ministry. There are hostels there, there is a huge building now being used by the women’s University. We need to resuscitate that and we need to take that back into the Ministry of Education and our intention is to establish a regional training centre at Mount Pleasant, so that systematically we ensure that as many of our existing teachers are brought in to that centre and trained in the use of computer technology. In a general sense of course using PCs, but also in that very specific sense of using the Podcast technology that we intend rolling out into all our schools countrywide.

Ladies and Gentleman I need to end. We can look at what I have said today in 2 ways. We can look at it as a daunting challenge which it is. The resources that we need to roll this out are indeed daunting and it is going to be a major battle for us to secure sufficient funding to achieve these goals. But we can also look at it very positively, as an opportunity to leapfrog other nations. One of the bizarre silver linings, in the clouds that have affected our country certainly in the last 10 years is that whilst we have lagged behind, relating to other countries, especially in the realm of information technology we now have an opportunity to leapfrog, to bring in the most modern, the most advanced technologies and in that way bring ourselves up to the level of Singapore, and South Korea and the other leading educational nations in the world. Our vision in the short term is to ensure that as many schools in the very least have Podcast technology, and projectors to that children can at the very least get just an inkling of that computers are all about. Also have the benefit of these teaching aids applications that are out there, and in that way enhance their studies. But in the long term we need to have a vision as a nation to progressively roll out information technology so in that 10/15 years every child that goes through our schools will understand how computers work, how to use them, because that is where the world is going. When you see what is available in schools in Singapore and South Korea and Finland you will be amazed. In those schools governments have poured money into information technology and literally in Singapore, every single child has access to a computer. That needs to be our vision. If we don’t collectively have that vision it doesn’t matter how many diamonds we have, how many platinum mines we may have, how beautiful our tourist facilities are, we will remain a second class citizen, because as we all know information technology and computers is the future and we need to provide our children with the means to embrace that future. That is why Chairman, conferences like this are so important because through conferences like this we can encourage each other capture some of this vision, and develop the momentum that we need in society to ensure that government, not just this government, but governments in future make this an absolute priority. Thank You.

Habakkuk Trust.blogspot.com

2 Feb 2011

By Linda Moyo

The Minister of Education, Sports, Arts and Culture Honourable Senator David Coltart on Friday called for the revamp of the education sector saying the education curriculum has for the past two decades not been reviewed and the history textbooks need to be re-written to reflect the true history of the country .Senator Coltart made these remarks at a Leadership Summit hosted by Habakkuk Trust .

According to the Minister, the education sector needs hundreds of million of United States dollars to turn the sector around because it has been under funded for the past two decades owing to the lack of political will to revamp sector.

Moreover the Minister said his ministry is trying to come up with text books in marginalised languages because for the last 30 years the focus has been on Shona and Ndebele.

‘We have sought to address the issue of minority languages and text books in Venda and Sotho are coming up,’ said the Minister.

The Minister also said the history curriculum has not been reviewed and was in-accurate because if you study the subject one does not get to understand who Joshua Nkomo is and what role ZAPU and ZIPRA played in the war of liberation.

‘The history curriculum is wrong because if you read it you can not tell who Joshua Nkomo was and what role ZAPU and ZIPRA played in the war’, said Honourable Coltart.

Senator Coltart further said teachers have lost motivation and Matabeleland South has lost a large number of Maths, Science and English teachers to the neighbouring countries like South Africa and Botswana who offer better remuneration and working conditions.

Of concern the Minister noted that students in Matabeleland walked long distances to school and the road networks were poor compelling students to play truancy and teachers not to go to those schools.

According to Senator Coltart because of low population density in Matabeleland there is need to build boarding schools and or to bus students from neighbouring communities.

‘The distances to be walked by students are too much and because Matabeleland is sparsely populated there is need to either build boarding schools or bus children to school,’ lamented Senator Coltart

Senator Coltart was speaking at the Matabeleland Leadership Summit organised by Habakkuk Trust last Friday to accord an opportunity for legislators, cabinet ministers and leaders of civic society, business and the church to explore ways of working together for the development of the region.

SWRadio Africa

2 February 2011

The Minister of Health and Child Welfare, Dr Henry Madzorera (right), speaks to SW Radio Africa journalist Lance Guma and answers questions sent in by the listeners. He is asked to explain his statement that Zimbabwe should export health care workers to other countries and replies to queries about corruption in the delivery of ARV’s, accusations of misuse of money at the National AIDS Council and what his ministry is doing to retain health care workers in the country? This is an excerpt of the interview.

Interview broadcast 02 February 2011

Lance Guma: Hello Zimbabwe and thank you for joining us on Question Time. Our guest today is the Minister of Health and Child Welfare Dr Henry Madzorera. Thank you for joining us.

Henry Madzorera: Thank you Lance.

Guma: OK now we start off with the editor of the NewZimbabwe.Com website, Mduduzi Mathuthu – he asks the first question and says in his own words – why haven’t you been as successful as David Coltart the Minister of Education in rallying international finance to rebuild the health sector?

Madzorera: Thank you for that very good question. Let me start by saying good evening to Zimbabwe. This question assumes that the minister of Education has been more successful in rallying international finance. I don’t know where they get that from or where the statistics come from but what I want to say is that there’s been a lot of support to the health sector, we’ve achieved a lot and there’s been a lot of international support.

I don’t think there is any ministry which is supported more than Health in this government of national unity. It might be that perhaps we have not shouted too much about it but let me just chronicle a few of the achievements we’ve had. You’ll know that on the HIV front we’ve got a Global Fund supporting Zimbabwe to the tune of several hundred million dollars.

We’ve got other programmes, organisations supported by various governments like the American government, the two CIDAS (Canadian and Swedish aid agencies) and , I’m referring here to the ESP (Expanded Support Programme); EGPAF (Elizabeth Glaser Paediatric AIDS Foundation) is doing a lot on the HIV front as well and they get funds from the American government and so this year alone they have received, I can’t accurately the figure but I think it’s around fifty million dollars to do prevention of mother to child transmission and paediatric Aids programmes and we launched this programme last week and it was in the public arena.

Then we go to the issue of infrastructure, rehabilitation – there has been a lot of support from many organisations, for example USAID helped us to rehabilitate infrastructure at our major central hospitals and some provincial hospitals and we are still getting support from other institutions. There’s been a lot of support in the area of drugs – that is why our drugs supply situation; particularly at primary care clinics have been good. In some instances going up to 90% of requirement.

This has come through other donors again who are working through UNICEF to procure what we have called Primary Care Kits. I could go on and on, we’ve got a lot of work and support going on in terms of health information systems and computerisation of the ministry so that data can flow smoothly from the primary care centre to head office.

We’ve had a lot of support on the cholera front; we continue to have support to manage cholera, to get commodities for preparedness sake; though we don’t have an outbreak going at the moment but for continued preparedness. I cannot finish chronicling the amount of assistance we are getting from partners.

On the human resources front, you know that again we have got a retention scheme going. We are the only ministry that has got a retention scheme for its workers so we do give a top up salary to all the health care workers and it has worked very well for us in terms of retaining health care workers, you won’t find that in Education.

Now I want to emphasise something – I don’t really want to compare what is happening in the ministry of Health with what is happening in Education; our problems are different, our needs are different. Education is doing extremely well I must agree right from the start and I want to congratulate Minister Coltart for the work that is happening in his ministry but to assume that not much is happening in Health would be erroneous as well.

New Zimbabwe.com

By Lunga Sibanda

1 February 2011

Teaching crisis … Matabeleland South has almost 1,000 teaching vacancies

CHANCES of a student from Matabeleland South enrolling at the University of Science and Technology (NUST) are reduced by 70 percent due to a secondary school teacher shortage for Science and Maths, an official said on Monday.

The province requires 261 Science teachers, but currently has 77 – representing a 70 percent shortfall. For Maths, only 106 of the 265 vacancies are filled, said Matabeleland South’s acting Provincial Education Director Samuel Selome.

The region only has one university – NUST – which is located in Bulawayo, and Selome warns that if the staffing crisis is not resolved, the region would be robbed of university education for its students.

“The situation is serious,” Selome said. “We have 70 percent vacancies for Science teachers and 60 percent for Maths.

“Beitbridge is the hardest hit area in the province with only 10 teachers for both Mathematics and Science in the district, while Matobo district is better staffed compared to other districts.”

No official staffing figures for schools in other provinces were available, but Selome said Matabeleland South was the worst affected.

Overall, the province has 452 teaching vacancies for primary schools and 335 for secondary schools.

Zimbabwe’s education sector is undergoing reform after a decade of decline occasioned by an economic dip and a long-running political crisis.

Education Minister David Coltart has indicated there may be as many as 20,000 teaching vacancies countrywide after educators quit for better paying jobs in foreign countries.

Herald

1 February 2011

The shortage of specialist teachers in Matabeleland South is a cause for concern and Government should swiftly address the problem, a Cabinet minister has said.

Addressing delegates at a meeting organised by Bulawayo Agenda last Fri-day, Education, Sport, Arts and Culture Minister David Coltart said Matabeleland South had the biggest shortage of Science and Mathematics teachers.

“Over the years the province has been affected by a mass exodus of teachers in these subjects, who have been absorbed into the education system of neighbouring countries like South Africa and Botswana.

“Because of the geographic position of the province, teachers in those areas find it easy to cross the border to seek better jobs abroad.

“There is need, therefore, for the Government to look into the issue and ensure there is staff retention so that the quality of education can improve,” he said.

Minister Coltart said this had resulted in increased recruitment of temporary teachers, something that can compromise standards.

He said the Education Ministry had printed textbooks for indigenous languages but expressed concern over the lack of trained teachers for the subjects.

“For the first time, we have produced Grade One to Seven textbooks for minority languages.

“We already have Tonga, Kalanga and Venda and we are in the process of printing Sotho and Ndau.

“This is in recognition of the fundamental need to teach indigenous minority languages in our schools.

“The problem is that there are no teachers to teach these jobs.

“Even training colleges have a low enrolment of teachers from Matabeleland region and that makes it difficult to promote minority languages and have trained teachers from this region,” he said.

Minister Coltart said children learn better in their mother language and added that it was their right to be taught in that medium at school.

He called for an urgent review of teachers’ conditions of service.

Minister Coltart paid tribute to the Zanu-PF Government for bringing significant development in the education sector after independence.

“We recognise that for the first decade after independence, Zanu-PF achieved a lot in development of the sector.

“They produced what was the best education system in Africa as a whole. They managed to reverse the colonial segregatory policies on education and brought education for all.

“Sadly all that investment has been made for the benefit of other countries that have absorbed our skilled human resources and today our education system is facing a lot of challenges,” he said.

Minister Coltart said Government had identified five key areas for improving the education system.

These include improving teachers’ welfare, upgrading the learning environment, reviewing the curriculum, improving school management, and financing of poor but talented pupils.

Newsday

By Khanyile Mlotshwa

1 February 2011

The Ministry of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture says there is need to have only those teachers fluent in local languages assigned to primary schools in Matabeleland regions.

Education minister David Coltart said the move was appropriate as the first two years of a child’s education were vital hence it was important that they learn in their mother language.

Coltart was speaking at a public meeting in Bulawayo on Friday.

“The most important building block in any child’s education is the first few years they get to learn to read and write in their mother language,” he said.

“They must be able to learn in the language their mother and father speak to them. It forms the basis of their learning. If they don’t get that chance their education will be prejudiced.”

He was responding to the public’s outrage over the general belief that most of the teachers at primary schools did not speak the local IsiNdebele language.

Coltart said the teaching of children by teachers who could communicate in their mother tongues was important even for the so-called minority languages in Zimbabwe.

“It shocked me to know that in the past 30 years, we have not had textbooks in marginalised languages. It is an indictment of the education system of this country. We have so far introduced textbooks from Grade 1 to 7 in marginalised languages.

“It’s not just a question of issuing textbooks. If you don’t have a teacher who can speak that language, the textbook is useless. We need to have teachers fluent in languages like Sotho, Venda and Kalanga,” said the minister.

He said the loss of the status and of young people’s faith in the teaching profession had affected mostly marginalised languages.

“There is a need to encourage students from marginalised communities and languages to train as teachers.

“We have to recover teachers who have gone to South Africa. We have to try and get them back. We have the obligation to make sure that the salary is attractive to them,” he said.

Coltart said the problem his ministry faced was that teachers were trained by different ministries.

“Teacher training is the responsibility of Higher Education and that is the source of the situation that we find ourselves in, where we end up with teachers that may not be conversant in local languages.

“Is it right that the training of teachers for my ministry be in the hands of another ministry? That is just a question I want you to think about,” Coltart said.

“Educationists in my ministry feel it is not right. We need to oversee the training of our teachers so that in their deployment,  we know the skills they will need, we know where they are needed and in what numbers,” he said.

Standard

Sunday View by benjamin Chitate

30 January 2011

Politicians and political commentators have had their say on the ascendancy of Professor Welshman Ncube to the helm of MDC-N. Some have dismissed his rise as a non-event, while others have showered him with praise and embraced him as a capable and intelligent leader.

What most of the commentators seemed to miss is the tribalistic element in Professor Ncube’s rise which was pronounced by Professor Ncube himself and the late MDC-M Vice-President Gibson Sibanda. The commentators may have missed media articles in which Professor Ncube and the late Gibson Sibanda told a rally in Bulawayo that they had made a mistake inviting Professor Mutambara to lead the party. They both reportedly bemoaned the invitation of a Shona person to lead the party, and vowed that come next election, they would field a Ndebele as a candidate for presidency.

In my opinion, that is where Professor Ncube got it wrong. People should not be elected to leadership for a non-tribalistic national political party on tribal basis, yet all that Professor Ncube and the late Sibanda wanted was a Ndebele person to be the next leader of the splinter group and be able to contest in the country’s next presidential elections.

If Professor Ncube and the late Gibson Sibanda were as talented and intelligent as Silence Chihuri and others who have heaped praise on Professor Ncube want us to believe, the two would have said the party made the mistake of inviting someone who had not been in the party for two years as required by both MDCs’ constitutions.

They appointed someone who had been out of the country for too long and was out of touch with local realities, someone who had not been actively involved in party politics apart from stints with the now defunct Zimbabwe Unity Movement while a student at the University of Zimbabwe.

Having played a meaningful role in the formation of the National Constitutional Assembly, and having been the founding secretary-general of the original MDC were enough reasons to justify MDC-N presidency for Professor Ncube, rather than talk about the need for a Ndebele leader for the party and for the nation. Yes, Ndebeles, like every other Zimbabwean, have the right to contest for any position in a political party and at government level, but not when they say, vote for me because I am Ndebele as is the case here.

Another blunder which could cost Professor Ncube’s political career is his public refusal to work with MDC-T in the next election. If the media did not misquote him, he is said to have said it was to be each man for himself, and there was no way his party would work with another party, especially MDC-T, blaming the failure for the two parties to work together in the last election on Morgan Tsvangirai, never bothering to acknowledge the fact that it was the then MDC-M which made unrealistic demands on the proportion of candidates each party was supposed to field especially in Bulawayo.

In fact the MDC-T came out with more seats in Bulawayo than they had negotiated for. To blame Tsvangirai for the failure to reach agreement in the last election is out of question.

Going it alone in the next elections may prove to be the end of MDC-N, especially if mass defections of councillors and other officials to MDC-T in Matebeleland are anything to go by.

More progressive politicians in MDC-N like David Coltart, have been recently quoted saying going it alone reduces the chances of defeating Robert Mugabe the dictator and they would be happier if political parties opposed to the dictator could work together in the next elections.

I have nothing against Professor Ncube, as I actually admire some of his strengths, but his blunders may wipe off his strengths and he may find himself in the political dustbin.

Benjamin Chitate writes from New Zealand.