admintheme “Eliminating harmful social and cultural practices affecting children – Our responsibility!”
Schools that presented plays at the theatre gala included Fletcher High School, Guinea Fowl High School, Matinunura High School, Regina Mundi High School and Thornhill High School. Several school theatre groups could not attend the theatre gala because they were busy preparing for the provincial commemoration of the Day of the African Child scheduled the following day.
Accompanying theatre groups were dance groups from the same schools which performed in between theatre performances.
Lloyd Phiri, who is the co-ordinator of the ZiTA theatre programmes in the Midlands Province and one of the organisers of the theatre gala, indicated that he was very impressed by content and quality of the plays from the different schools which dealt with issues such as “kuripa ngozi” (when a family gives away a girl child as payment for the death of a man caused by one of theirs),forcing girl children into early marriages, unreported rape, abduction of girl children and murdering of children for ritual purposes.
Phiri contented. “Some of the plays prescribed the imposition of death sentences to people convicted of carrying out serious crimes against children.”
The evaluation of all the plays presented at the gala was done by Evidence Machira and Lloyd Phiri, who took time to indicate theatre production areas and issues on staging of the plays which needed attention. Such evaluation is essential in providing the young thespians with directions, encouraging their creativity, introducing constructive criticism, and providing essential tips on effective theatre production techniques.
Evaluation of theatre performances outside competitions tend to be appreciated by young thespians when theatre experts making comments are sharing their many years valuable experiences and what has made them successful.
It is crucial to make young thespian appreciate that one can never learn everything that makes successful theatre and that therefore thespians are perpetual students of theatre especially if one is constantly creating plays and performing them to different audience and watching other people productions.
It was good that the issue of eliminating harmful social and cultural practices affecting children was not only presented in the plays by the different theatre groups but was also taken up in speeches by two members of the Junior Parliament of Zimbabwe – a junior Member of Parliament for Gweru from Fletcher High School and Junior Parliament Deputy Prime Minister from Guinea Fowl High School.
The two VIPs took the opportunity of this well- attended theatre gala to speak about the importance of the Day of the African Child and the use of theatre to articulate the view of children on how to eliminate harmful social and cultural practices affecting children.
The Midlands provincial officer of the National Arts Council also took the platform of the theatre gala to encourage schools to continue to collaborate with the Zimbabwe Theatre Association in developing theatre skills among schoolchildren and in creating regular spaces for presenting and consuming their theatre products – spaces which become viable and vibrant theatre workshops .
When schoolchildren regularly create plays on different themes and are able to find opportunities to perform their plays to other children, they not acquire skills to create and perform theatre but also learn to become responsible audiences and constructive theatre critics especially when they are given opportunities to hear constructive comments about their own work from theatre celebrities and accomplished thespians in their community.
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