Reconsider position on school fees

According to parents, most of them have been struggling to raise money for fees and some of them in fact owe schools money in unpaid fees and levies. The parents have appealed to Government to guard against making education a preserve of the rich. We totally agree with parents that Government has an obligation to ensure all Zimbabweans enjoy their right to access education regardless of one’s status. What this entails is that fees and levies should remain affordable to the majority of parents.

The schools should therefore not be allowed to charge exorbitant fees and levies. It is not a secret that our economy is underperforming and as such most companies are not operating at full throttle. The majority of workers including civil servants are as a result still earning salaries below the Poverty Datum Line which is pegged at about $500. The school authorities should, when pegging fees, take into account these realities on the ground.

Many companies including parastatals are staggering payment of salaries while others are just paying a fraction of what they are supposed to pay. We agree with the Minister of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture David Coltart that schools need to urgently rehabilitate run-down infrastructure. We have already stated that most of the learning materials have been provided by Government while parents are buying the remainder.

The money paid as school fees and levies should therefore be directed towards rehabilitation of infrastructures and buying of essentials such as furniture. The parents already have too much in their hands given the fact that since the introduction of the multi-currency system, they have been forced to pay incentives to teachers, a responsibility which is supposed to be that of the employer, which is Government.

It is grossly unfair for a Government Minister like Coltart to openly declare that fees increases are inevitable when he knows too well that companies including Government are not increasing salaries next year. Where are parents expected to get these increased fees from? The Government should reconsider its position regarding fees increase as allowing the increase will be going against its policy which stipulates that every child has a right to education and that includes children from poor families. Some school authorities are proposing outrageous increases of more than 50 percent. In the event of

Government allowing schools to increase fees, the margins should just be reasonable given the country’s level of inflation.
We have said it before that education should never be made a preserve of the rich but a right that must be enjoyed by all Zimbabwean children. The fact that Government is not allocating enough money to the Education sector from its national budget cannot be an excuse to punish the already overburdened parents.

It is Minister Coltart’s responsibility to convince his Cabinet colleagues to prioritise education when it comes to allocation of resources. The parents have sacrificed enough to ensure the education sector ticks and to expect them to do more is being unreasonable. We want to once again implore Minister Coltart to ensure that no pupil is forced to drop out of school because his or her parent cannot afford fees come next year.