Primary school children like the ones pictured here in Zimbabwe's capital Harare often drop out of school, casting doubts on this Southern African nation's capacity to achieve universal primary education for all by December 2015. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS

By Jeffrey Moyo
HARARE, Dec 24 2014 (IPS)

Zimbabwe boasts of one of the highest rates of literacy across Africa but, but without free primary education, achieving universal primary education here may remain a pipe dream, educationists say.

It would also defeat Zimbabwe’s quest to reach the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by the deadline of 2015.

One of the MDGs requires countries the world over to achieve universal primary education by the end of 2015 and reintroduce free primary education. But more than 34 years after gaining independence from Britain, educationists say Zimbabwe is far from attaining universal primary education for all.

“Hordes of pupils enrolled in schools after independence at a time the Zimbabwean government made education free at primary school level,” Thabo Hlalo, a retired educationist from Zimbabwe’s Midlands Province, told IPS.“Without free primary education, school attendance has become intermittent, meaning that achieving universal primary education in line with the U.N. MDGs may remain imaginary for Zimbabwe” – Thabo Hlalo, retired educationist from Zimbabwe’s Midlands Province

”But now without free primary education, school attendance has become intermittent, meaning that achieving universal primary education in line with the U.N. MDGs may remain imaginary for Zimbabwe.”

At independence in 1980, the Zimbabwean government abolished all primary school tuition fees, but they have now crept in and crept up. Parents not only contend with fees that they cannot afford but also with expensive essentials like notebooks and uniforms.

Early this year, Zimbabwe reportedly approached the United Kingdom for funds to help cover fees for an estimated one million pupils who would otherwise be forced out of school. The cash-strapped government said it was unable to finance its Basic Education Assistance Module (BEAM), a scheme meant for poor children.

The U.K. government provided 10 million dollars from its Department for International Development but warned it may be the last contribution.

The school fees have been defended by Zimbabwe’s Education Minister Lazarus Dokora, who has gone on record as saying that parents who default on the fees should be taken to court.

Dokora’s “warning” comes despite the fact that at least 95 percent of Zimbabweans voted in a referendum in March last year to adopt a new Constitution expressly granting free primary education to all. Specifically, Section75 (1) (a) of the Zimbabwean Constitution provides for the right to state-funded basic education.

Despite this constitutional provision, it is still a sad story for many children like 9-year-old Tobias Chikota from Harare’s Caledonia informal settlement located about 30km south-east of Harare, the Zimbabwean capital.

“I dropped out of school early this year because my unemployed parents couldn’t afford to pay my school feels,” Chikota, who at the time was in Primary Four, told IPS.

While it is a requirement for nations to ensure a predictable and adequate state budget allocation to education under the MDGs, civil society activists here say the Zimbabwean government seems way off the mark in terms of prioritising education.

“Despite the impending deadline for the attainment of the MDGs, our government has not been and remains inconsistent in its budgetary structures in practically directing money towards education, which may make the attainment of universal primary education for all difficult, if not impossible, by 2015,” Catherine Mukwapati, a civil society activist and director of the Youth Dialogue Action Network, a democracy lobby group in Zimbabwe, told IPS.

Earlier this year, the Zimbabwean government allocated 919 million dollars to the country’s education sector in its 2015 national budget announcement, but for Mukwapati these were “mere void commitments made on paper, hardly followed by action as customary with our government.

Through UNICEF’s Education Transition Fund (ETF), the Zimbabwean government distributed 13 million textbooks to 5,575 schools countrywide in 2010, resulting in each pupil in primary schools countrywide receiving a set of four basic textbooks.

In spite of this gesture, a 2012 report by Zimbabwe’s Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Education found that the country’s rural teachers are overwhelmed with work, operating at a ratio of one teacher to 60 pupils, far over the government-pegged teacher-pupil ratio of one to 40.

According to Save the Children, for over 3.2 million children enrolled in primary and secondary schools in Zimbabwe, there are only about 102,000 teachers.

A UNICEF report on the Status of Women’s and Children’s Rights in Zimbabwe released in 2012 says that at least 197,000 pupils drop out of primary schools each year, a situation that development experts here say hinders Zimbabwe from achieving universal primary education for all in line with the MDGs.

“School dropouts owing to lack of school fees, mostly at primary level, are peaking up annually and, therefore, talking about Zimbabwe achieving primary education for all by 2015 is a non-starter,” independent development expert Evans Dube told IPS.

And for many parents like 43-year-old Tambudzai Chihota, a widow whose six children are out of school due to non-payment of school fees, the promise of universal primary education means little.

“My children didn’t go beyond Grade [Primary] Five here because I had no money to pay their school fees and the universal primary education you talk about may not be my business as long as my children are still without access to further education,” Chihota told IPS.

The crisis facing the education system here has also been worsened by the flight of about 20,000 teachers from the country between 2007 and 2009 at the peak of Zimbabwe’s economic crisis.

Besides extremely low salaries, the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ), a teachers’ trade union organisation in Zimbabwe, says that morale is low among teachers, negatively affecting the quality of the country’s education.

An average teacher earns 400 dollars a month, well below the poverty datum line of 511 dollars a month for an average family of five in this Southern African nation.

“Universal education may be far from being achieved here by 2015 due to poor teachers’ salaries, causing a deterioration of the quality of education,” Raymond Majongwe, Secretary General of PTUZ, told IPS.

With just over 12 months left before the deadline for achievement of the MDGs, it appears unlikely that Zimbabwe will meet the target of universal primary education for all.

(Edited by Lisa Vives/Phil Harris)

Keddy Olanya, one of northern Uganda’s few female motorbike taxi or bodaboda drivers, wears an ankle-length dress and sandals so as not to offend her customers. Credit: Amy Fallon/IPS

By Amy Fallon
GULU, Uganda, Jun 4 2013 (IPS)

It is swerves and roundabouts for Keddy Olanya, a 32-year-old wife and mother of three from Gulu, northern Uganda, who is one of only a handful of female drivers negotiating the country’s potholed roads on a bodaboda or motorbike taxi. 

Olanya had been a teacher for a year in Lukome village, also in the country’s north, when she realised back in 2008 that she could make more money by moonlighting as a boda driver during weekends and school holidays.

A large number of men are earning a living through the trade. Yet there is only one other known female driver in Gulu, Olanya tells IPS. As a woman in a male-dominated industry, her gender can work for her, but also against her.

“Actually a female boda makes more money than the male boda,” admits the rider, who says she earned about 360,000 Ugandan shillings (138 dollars) a month in the classroom but can take home up to 50,000 Ugandan shillings (19 dollars) a day as a driver.
“I would like to encourage people to take up any form of work that they can do to earn themselves a living, without considering gender. Nowadays we are moving into a world of what? Of equality.” -- Keddy Olanya

“In most cases they trust female bodas more than men because of the way they drive. We are not so fast.”

The exact number of boda drivers in the country is unknown, although there is said to be over 145,000 in Kampala alone, according to a news report by local newspaper and online publication, Red Pepper.

This East African nation has been referred to as having a “bodaboda economy”, though statistics are hard to come by.

A 2002 United Kingdom Department for International Development-funded knowledge and research project by transport consultant John Howe, titled “Boda Boda – Uganda’s rural and urban low-capacity transport services”, said “about 1.6 million, or seven percent of (34.5 million people), depend for part of their livelihood on the industry. The livelihoods of a further 100,000 are supported from the repair and sustenance services the industry needs.”

The nasty stares and comments from some male drivers when Olanya’s on the road, or at her waiting point, are probably to be expected.

“Sometimes they can just say this job is fit for women who are not married, that I’m too gentle for the job, that I’m stepping too low,” describes Olanya.

On the other hand, she must often deal with regular attempted breaches of the client-customer relationship.

“Always when you’re carrying the men some are flattering you, some of them (make comments about) making love,” says Olanya.

“Some of them want to offer you more money than what you’ve charged. Taking advantage. You have to be principled.

“There are some jobs that require principles. Especially the work of a boda. It’s not easy.”

Having spent years dealing with stubborn students Olanya, who today has been driving her TVS heavy duty bike, a bike from one of India’s manufacturers, in an ankle-length dress and sandals, says she knows how “not to get customers annoyed.”

“You just talk softly but you have to stand your ground,” she explains.

It is the ridicule from members of the same sex, which is perhaps the most hurtful and frustrating.

“Some of them admire me. But some say I better look for other options, like maybe doing a business,” says Olanya.

“They just have that opinion that the boda’s not for women, it’s only supposed to be for men and not for professional women like me, a salary earner.

“They think that anyone involved in boda riding is a useless person.”

Olanya is adamant she is anything but that – and vows she will not be giving up her part-time gig any time soon.

“I would like to encourage people to take up any form of work that they can do to earn themselves a living, without considering gender. Nowadays we are moving into a world of what? Of equality,” she stresses.

“Women are advocating for equality. We should not say that this is for male, this is for female. Just anything that can earn you a living, please do it, other than despising some other job.”

Olanya is part of a growing trend of teachers and other professionals moonlighting as drivers to make ends meet.

Wilfred*, 35, a police constable in Kampala, has been working as a part-time rider five days a week for six months “for survival”.

“Many police are doing it,” says Wilfred, who says he earns about 125 dollars a month through his full-time job.

“It is necessary because the salary we get is not enough.” He tells IPS he normally earns about 20,000 Ugandan shillings (seven dollars) a day from picking up and dropping off passengers.

Flavia Nuwabine, 23, from Kyebando in Kampala has been a boda driver for two years and says she does not know of any other lady drivers in the capital. She turned to the trade after studying hotel management and catering, and discovering it paid a mere 100,000 Ugandan shillings (38 dollars) a month.

She carries people and parcels. Today she is weighed down with reams of A4 computer paper and soap, which she is taking across town to a local business. Nuwabine says she can earn 30,000 Ugandan shillings (11 dollars) in an average day.

Nuwabine admits she would rather be doing a job for which she’d studied, but says she’s happy to be making more money.

“My bosses were giving me 100,000 a month which wasn’t enough for me,” Nuwabine, who works six days a week from 7am until 6pm, tells IPS.

“They (both sexes) say nasty comments about me.

“The ladies, they say that job is for men. They say it is very, very bad, that I’m a young lady. I’m earning. That’s all.”

*Surname withheld.

By Mekonnen Teshome and Miriam Gathigah
ADDIS ABABA , Feb 21 2012 (IPS)

Ethiopia says that the double-digit economic growth the country has experienced over the last seven years has started benefitting its majority by boosting their income and productivity in agriculture and small-scale businesses.

While the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank state that the country has registered 8.7 percent GDP growth, the government claims the economy has grown by 11.4 percent.

However, the country was declared the second-fastest growing economy in Africa for 2011, after Ghana, in the annual economic report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).

In the past, Ethiopia has made headlines for recording some of the worst famine situations in Africa, and for its poor health indicators – it has posted one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. In 2005, 871 women died per 100,000 live births.

But this is slowly changing as the government has made progress in the provision of social services such as health, education and infrastructure.

“In 2010, Ethiopia continued to register the fast growth, as it has for the last five years. GDP growth in 2010 remained strong at 8.8 percent. Growth is driven by the service sector (14.5 percent), followed by the industrial (10.2 percent) and agricultural (six percent) sectors,” the ECA report indicated.

In an exclusive interview with IPS, State Minister of the Office of Government Communication Affairs, Alemayehu Ejigu, said Ethiopia has registered remarkable growth by increasing major crop production from 11.9 percent in 2005 to 18.08 percent by the end of 2010. People’s lives are changing for the better in rural and urban areas because of health facilities and infrastructure development, he said.

Ejigu attributed the success to the effective implementation of the national five-year Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP). He said that the country’s GTP for 2011 to 2016 would help Ethiopia join the grouping of middle-income countries.

Ejigu also told IPS that the government planned job creation opportunities through the construction of 73,000 kilometres of rural roads. “This would create an opportunity for farmers to easily transport agricultural products to market,” Ejigu said.

Abeba Bezu, an economic affairs consultant in Addis Ababa, said that under the country’s ambitious Plan for Accelerated and Sustained Development to End Poverty government had reduced poverty from 38.7 percent in 2005 to 31 percent five years later.

“Although struggling with a large population estimated to be 82 million people, making it the second-most populous country in Sub-Saharan Africa, there has been significant progress towards improving livelihoods. There is notable development.”

However, assistant Professor Teshome Adugna at the Economics Department of the Ethiopian Civil Service University cautioned that as GDP considers the market value of goods and services, it cannot be a perfect instrument to show the country’s actual growth, given Ethiopia’s poor record handling and management systems.

“Since the GDP reporting does not provide information on who produces how much, it is difficult to know how individual citizens benefit from the reported growth,” he said.

Adugna described Ethiopia’s growth as “broad-based”, which he attributed to the growth of the agricultural, industrial and service sectors.

“Of course, we should not expect urban unemployment to end very shortly,

“I can say that many people are benefiting from the economic growth in Ethiopia, but I would not say that the life of the majority has improved. We need time to bring about social development that can change the lives of the majority.”

Ten years ago, only two thirds of Ethiopians had access to healthcare services, leaving another 68 million people across the expansive rural areas in dire need.

“Since 2004, the Ministry of Health has expanded access to healthcare through the Health Extension Programme (HEP), which targets the rural population,” said Amanuel Ayalew, a volunteer health worker in northern Ethiopia.

As a result, Ethiopia’s country report by the Department for International Development (DFID), the United Kingdom’s government department responsible for promoting development and poverty reduction, revealed that the impact of the health programme is notable since HEP reaches nine million households. DFID will spend an average of 524 million dollars per year in Ethiopia until 2015.

With more than 35 million insecticide-treated bed nets for malaria, there has been a 73 percent reduction in malaria cases. This, coupled with a massive and consistent vaccination programme for children under five against killer diseases, has seen deaths in that age group reduced by a significant 62 percent in villages with access to HEP.

There are now about 1.4 million more women on contraceptives than there were in 2005, and the gross primary school enrolment rate has risen from 91.3 to 96 percent between 2005 and 2010.

However, challenges remain.

“In spite of a constituent economic growth of double digits in the last five years with economic analysts projecting a similarly impressive growth, sustainable growth and poverty reduction remains a challenge,” Bezu said.

A majority of rural poor are still grappling with severe climate change and are still highly susceptible to drought.

It is a situation that government partially acknowledges. “When we say the country is growing it does not mean that every citizen has no problem…even in the United States there are people who are provided with food aid,” Ejigu said. He, however, added that no one would die of starvation as there would be no food shortages in the country.

It is a view that the leader of the opposition Ethiopian Democratic Party, Mushe Semu, does not agree with.

“Ethiopia is a country where many citizens are starved. It is not a question of having food two or three times a day,” Semu told IPS.

He said it was impossible for Ethiopia to become a middle-income country. “When we think of the majority of the Ethiopian population we are talking about our farmers and rural communities that are 85 percent of the people. Here, the land management and fertility should be considered,” he said.

He said that without effectively distributing all arable land to people, and with the prevailing land degradation, it was not possible to bring about development.

The country is not conducive for private sector growth, analysts say.

The newly completed African Union building in downtown Addis Ababa. Credit: Mekonnen Teshome/IPS

“Although the government envisions a private sector led development, the environment is not conducive for the growth of the private sector. In fact, private investment as a percentage of GDP has remained on the decline since 2004,” Bezu said.

In a World Bank global survey dubbed Ease of Doing Business, in 2010 and 2011 Ethiopia ranked 103 and 104 respectively out of 183 countries.

But meanwhile, civil servant Abiy Getahun said that the double-digit economic growth repeatedly propagated by the government media has not yet brought the desired social development to his life. He cited the low wages paid in Ethiopia, which, according to him, are low compared to the rest of Africa. In the 2011 U.N. Development Programme’s Human Development Report Ethiopia ranks 174 out of 187 countries worldwide.

He said that most people, especially urban dwellers, could not withstand the skyrocketing price of good and services.

“The total salary increment I got over the last 10 years is only 400 Ethiopian Birr (less than 25 dollars) while the price of goods and services has risen in an unbelievable manner.”

* Additional reporting by Miriam Gathigah in Nairobi.

(END/2012)

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