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From George Maponga in Masvingo
Government has secured $20 million for the construction of 20 new primary and secondary schools across the country before the end of this year. Primary and Secondary Education Minister Lazarus Dokora said Government intended to build over 2 000 new primary and secondary schools over the next few years to make sure that all parts of the country were fully serviced in terms of access to education. The new thrust by Government would see new schools being built mainly in remote rural parts of the country where pupils where walking long distances to and from school.

Resettlement areas would also immensely benefit as most school children in these areas were conducting lessons in dilapidated structures that were converted into makeshift classrooms. Minister Dokora said Zimbabwe secured an $18 million loan from Arab countries for the construction of new schools while Treasury chipped in with a further $2 million.

Speaking on the sidelines of the official opening of a library and prize giving day at Pamushana High School in Bikita over the weekend, Minister Dokora said most of the new schools would be constructed in resettlement areas. “We managed to get a loan of $18 million from Arab countries while Government made available $2 million which should be enough to construct 20 new schools in selected different parts of the country,’’ he said.

“Our target is construction of 20 schools before the end of this year. We should build a total of 2056 new primary and secondary schools around Zimbabwe to enable people to get easy access to education,’’ he added. He said Government would prioritise upgrading existing satellite schools into fully-fledged stand-alone institutions before starting to build completely new schools.

“Our target is to complete those schools that are currently at various stages of completion and those institutions that have been serving as satellite schools,’’ he said. Minister Dokora also revealed that his ministry had also embarked on a teacher capacity development programme to upgrade the skills of teachers and ultimately improve the quality of education in local schools.

About 2 500 teachers countrywide have already started upgrading their skills under the programme with another 2 500 teachers expected to join the programme before year end.