Sunday News
Sunday News Reporter
21 February 2010

Zimbabweans from Matabeleland based in the United States met the Minister of Education, Sport, Arts, and Culture, Senator David Coltart, during his visit to that country to develop new strategies of improving Mathematics and Science results in the region’s schools.

The group calling itself Mthwakazi Education Committee said it is prepared to work with the ministry to bring the changes to the education sector in the region.

In 2007, the District Education Officer, Mr Dan Moyo, said they had set aside Mpopoma High School as a science centre in the region and Townsend High School as an agriculture centre.

He said this was meant to develop the quality of science results in the region and ensure that students from this region also made it to study sciences at university.

The committee chairperson, Dr Ernest Simela, said there was a need to work hand in glove with the ministry to bring results in science education in the region.

“This requires us to develop a database of qualified and willing people that can be involved,” he said.

The meeting was held in New York City in the United States of America on 2 February this year.

The committee presented a paper titled, The Rehabilitation of Education in Zimbabwe with Input for Matabeleland and Midlands Regions.

The committee consists of Dr Simela, Mr Julian Bhebhe, Mr Dominic Muntanga and Ms Thokozile Mkwananzi.

Dr Simela said the development of the new education strategy had to take into cognisance the fact that the Matabeleland region had for long been neglected.

“The new strategy should focus on the critical need for the development of Math and Science centres with a nationwide equitable distribution and most importantly recognising the neglect that has occurred in Matabeleland,” he said.

The committee chairperson said it is important for the region to actively participate in the curriculum review.

“Curriculum review is important and it is in the region’s interest to partner in this process. We stressed our desire to be involved in the process,” he said.

The committee said it is also important to focus on the computerisation of schools to reduce the digital divide.

“The senator talked about his own experience with old computers donated to Founders High School. The school was able to set them up and use them,” he said.
The committee said the problems in education were familiar territory as none of the issues presented to Senator Coltart were foreign to him as he is familiar with the plight of the region.

“Our interest to partner with him was expressed clearly. “To that he responded by highlighting the gravity of the task he has at hand in his efforts to re-build the educational system of Zimbabwe,” said Dr Simela.

He said, on his part, the minister said he requires resources to develop a new website for the ministry to be utilised for the proposal of policies, the partnership of people with similar skills and utilisation by the academies of excellence for fundraising and collection of school supplies and books.

“The website will also be helpful in the networking and recruiting of Math and Science teachers from other parts of the world,” he said.

The committee suggested a number of schools to be developed as academies of excellence in the region among them Milton High and Evelyn High both in Bulawayo, Plumtree High in Plumtree and JZ Moyo in West Nicholson.

The Herald

19 February 2010

Harare — GOVERNMENT says it presently has no solution to the civil servants’ strike that enters its second full week today.

This came as unionists said they would hold a report back meeting with their members in the Harare Gardens today after which they will march through the city centre.

The Public Service Commission has since declared the strike illegal, ordering State employees who have not been reporting for duty to do so immediately.

Yesterday, PSC chairman Dr Mariyawanda Nzuwah declined to comment on what action they were going to take after that warning went largely unheeded.

The strike has not caught on in many Government departments, but some schools have been negatively affected, especially in rural and peri-urban areas where parents are not forthcoming with incentives.

Education, Sport, Arts and Culture Minister David Coltart conceded Government was still to find a solution to the impasse.

“The position is unchanged. There is no resolution between employees and Government and we are still pursuing all available options to end the strike.

“One of the solutions is to continue negotiations with all parties,” he said.

Minister Coltart warned teachers against inducing parents to pay them allowances in return for lessons for their children.

The minister refused to comment on today’s rally, referring all questions to Public Service Minister Eliphas Mukonoweshuro, who was not answering his cellphone.

Mrs Tendai Chikowore, who chairs the Apex Council, that brings together all civil service unions said they would decide on what course of action to take after briefing their counterparts.

“It will be up to them to tell us what course of action to take,” she said.

New Ziana quoted Public Service Association executive secretary Mr Emmanuel Tichareva as saying: “Civil servants are still on strike and tomorrow (today) union leaders will be meeting civil servants as we try to chart the way forward.

“We will be informing members on what we have gathered from meetings with other members in different cities.”

Zimbabwe Teachers’ Association chief executive Mr Sifiso Ndlovu added: “We will hold a public meeting with members which will be followed by a march from Harare Gardens through Julius Nyerere Way, Nelson Mandela Avenue to Fourth Street.

“We will pass through Kaguvi Building and the New Government Complex handing out petitions to the ministries of Finance and Public Service.”

A snap survey yesterday showed most Government departments were functional though some were only manned by senior staff.

Those schools that have agreed incentives schemes with parents are open while others remain shut.

At Beatrice Government Boarding Primary School, the headmistress was moving from class to class giving pupils work to do.

“I am the only one attending to these children. I cannot ask why a teacher is absent as I fully understand the situation.

“We cannot close the school because it is a boarding school, I just have to hang around and see that the children have someone to look after them,” she said.

At Gilstone Primary and Secondary School teachers and parents were locked in a meeting to map the way forward.

“Once we agree on a suitable figure we are going to commence lessons,” one of the teachers said.

Classrooms were locked at Ardno Primary School and there was no sign of teachers or students.

School children interviewed said they last had lessons in January.

General Agriculture and Plantation Workers’ Union information officer Mr Tapiwa Zivira said teachers at farm schools were demanding US$1 per subject for secondary school students and the same amount per primary school pupil.

“Farm labourers are failing to raise such figures because the majority earn US$32 per month.

“Ten schools in Chegutu’s farming and surrounding rural areas had more than 450 school dropouts before the strike because of difficulties in raising school fees,” he said.

In Zhombe, Mrs Petronella Sayi said pupils at Fafi Primary School had stopped going to school because of the strike.

In most of Harare’s high-density schools, lessons were in full swing.

Civil servants are demanding a minimum monthly salary of US$630 up from the current average of US$160.

Government has reportedly factored in the US$15 allowance it promised for this month’s salaries.

Guardian.co.uk
David Smith in Johannesburg
Tuesday 16 February

Opponents condemn proposals to mark Zimbabwean president’s 86th birthday as unemployment reaches nine in 10

Plans to hold a lavish all-night birthday party for the Zimbabwean president, Robert Mugabe, were today condemned as insensitive to the suffering of the country’s people.

Mugabe’s 86th birthday will be celebrated next week with an “extravagant overnight gala” starring local and international musicians, the Zimbabwe Times reported.
The paper said Anywhere Mutambudzi, a retired army major who is an official with the information ministry, would organise the event – being held in Bulawayo – which would run from 6pm on 26 February until 6am the following day.

It quoted Mutambudzi as telling state television: “The gala will feature all major local, as well as some foreign, musicians from the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa.”

Mugabe, whose birthday is on 21 February, shows no signs of slowing down or willingness to relinquish power to Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), his rival in Zimbabwe’s unity government.

Opponents criticised the party plans at a time when Zimbabwe’s teachers are on strike over pay and around nine in 10 people are unemployed.

Simba Makoni, a former senior member of Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party, said: “I’m not aware of the source of the money, but I suspect that state resources will be funnelled to this event improperly.

“If they use state funds for a private citizen’s birthday when basic services are starved of funding, it would be the worst degree of insensitivity and disregard for the needs of the people of Zimbabwe.

“It would be an act of gross negligence and incompetence … no competent state would do such a thing.”

David Coltart, the education minister in the power-sharing government, said: “If this is private money, it’s none of my business.

“However, if it’s government money then it’s better spent on school textbooks.”

Coltart, a member of the MDC, added that “all the most flamboyant displays of wealth are inappropriate” at a time when government spending on education was paltry.

Raymond Majongwe, the secretary general of the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe, said he did not object to the celebration in principle but added that an extravagant cost would “not be in order” when the union’s members were being forced to take industrial action.

Since 1986, Mugabe’s birthday celebrations have been organised by a Zanu-PF youth group called the 21 February Movement, initially modelled on scouting and aimed at promoting children’s rights.

Last year, the president celebrated his 85th birthday with a week of parties costing hundreds of thousands of US dollars.

The events included a banquet, a gala dinner, a public feast and a concert at which dozens of animals were slaughtered.

More pomp and ceremony is expected for the 30th anniversary of Zimbabwe’s independence from Britain in April – also signifying Mugabe’s 30 years in power.

The MDC said last week that fresh elections may be needed after the latest efforts to end deadlock with Mugabe in the one-year-old unity government ended in failure.

PSNews.com.au
15 February 2010

The Minister for Education, Sport, Arts and Culture in Zimbabwe has called on the Government to create a computerised database of its employees.

The Minister, Senator David Coltart said the move would help weed out ghost workers who were claiming pay cheques without being members of the Public Service.

“Government has been duped of a lot of cash through ghost workers,” Mr Coltart said.

“But if we were computer networked, thousands of dollars would have been saved.

He said his Ministry was making efforts to keep a computer-based list of teachers in the service to make it easier for the Government to compile a record of teachers working in Zimbabwe.

Mr Coltart said creating a computer database of names was needed to provide a smooth flow of information between Government head offices and provincial and district offices.

He said information was transmitted manually.

“The manual system we have been using for the past years has resulted in Government losing a lot of money,” Mr Coltart said.

“We must have a situation whereby every school will be linked to the ministry.

“A person in another province should be well informed of what is happening at their head office.”

He said the major challenge facing the new system was finding the necessary resources and people with adequate technical skills.

“The process is expensive, but I have spoken to officials from World Bank and some donor agencies that have agreed to chip in financially,” Mr Coltart said.