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Manicaland Correspondent
At  least five boarding schools in Manicaland are seeking permission to either increase boarding fees or close early citing dwindling food supplies due to shortages on the market and high prices on available stocks.

Two of the schools are Marange High and Mutare Girls’ High.

Manicaland provincial education director (PED), Mr Edward Shumba, confirmed receiving the requests.

On increasing school fees, he said the schools would need to agree with parents and then send their request to his office for approval.

“Schools should agree with parents first then write a request to my office for approval, but this must be just for the remaining days of the term and not a permanent feature,” said Mr Shumba.

The situation has not spared trust and private schools including Hillcrest, which has since requested parents to top up on school fees.

Hillcrest school head, Mrs Annie Holman, said the increase in prices of food stuffs and other commodities had affected the school budget.

“We have asked for a top up of fees because prices have gone up by at least 60 percent, which has affected our budget and now we are not going to be able to complete the term if we are to maintain our standards, so we had to ask parents to top up fees,” Mrs Holman said.