Learners at Sally Mugabe Primary School, formerly Russel Primary School in Kwekwe District, Midlands Province, are vulnerable to cholera after the school received more than 1 000 learners from Globe and Phoenix Primary School.
As reported by The NewsHawks, the Civil Protection Unit (CPU) in Kwekwe District relocated learners from Globe and Phoenix Primary School to Sally Mugabe after classrooms caved in due to illegal mining last year.
However, authorities have not expanded water and sanitation facilities at Russel Primary to accommodate learners from Globe and Phoenix. This week, Fortune Mpungu, the Kwekwe CPU chairperson, told NewsHawks that the facilities at Sally Mugabe can cater for learners from Globe and Phoenix. He said:
We have provided temporary classroom tents at the school where the pupils have been relocated to and that is Sally Mugabe Primary. In terms of water and sanitation facilities, all the students are using the old ones. They are enough.
We are working with the Ministry of Health on preventing cholera at the school. We feel we are on top of the situation.
Besides, plans are already there for the construction of a new school and we are waiting for the rainy season to end so that the work can begin.
Plans and designs for the new school have already been drawn and very soon construction will begin. The stay of the pupils at that school is temporary.
However, The NewsHawks reported sources at Sally Mugabe Primary School as saying a health time bomb is looming at the institution. The CPU has not provided mobile toilets or water bowsers to cater for the increased number of pupils. Said the source:
We are talking about 1 300 pupils who have been relocated to a school that already had overpopulated children with limited water and sanitation facilities such as ablution blocks.
The number of students is overwhelming the facilities already and general workers are failing to maintain hygiene at the toilets. When there are water outages, there are no additional supplies that are on standby.
According to the Ministry of Health and Childcare, as of 07 February 2023, Midlands Province had 569 suspected Cholera cases, 17 confirmed cases, 528 recoveries, 0 confirmed deaths and 36 suspected deaths.
Globe and Phoenix Primary School, which was constructed more than a century ago, was abandoned after a classroom block collapsed into a mine shaft on 16 March 2023.
The learners have been learning under tents at Russell Primary School grounds where they have been camped since last year. The underground tunnels that destroyed the school were dug by illegal gold miners linked to ZANU PF.
Source: Zimbabwe news
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