News / Local
'Dokora not summoned over non-Ndebele teachers,' - Video
27 Jun 2014 at 14:44hrs | Views
The Ministry of education has dismissed media reports claiming that Primary and Secondary Education minister Lazarus Dokora was summoned for meetings on non-Ndebele teacher deployment in Matabeleland.
In a statement the ministry said Dokora is currently attending the global partnership for education conference in Belgium he left the country on 23 May.
Last week, Senior minister of State in the President's Office Simon Khaya Moyo summoned Dokora over engaging of non-Ndebele speaking teachers in the Matabeleland region
The matter has for the past couple of weeks raised the ire of a number of academics, pressure groups and parents who blamed the policy for contributing to the low pass rate in primary schools in the region.
Moyo told a local newspaper that he raised the issue with Dokora as it had become a concern to people in Matabeleland region.
"He promised that he will work on it and that he will soon work on modalities to have more Ndebele speaking teachers deployed in the region," he said.
Khaya Moyo said it did not make sense to have a teacher who could not even pronounce a single Ndebele word teaching Grade One pupils in Matabeleland.
"It boggles the mind that you find a teacher in Matabeleland who cannot even say salibonani, litshonanjani, then expect them to teach a pupil that very same language. It is just like a blind person leading another blind person, in such a situation
can we say this teacher is teaching or cheating.
"That is the reason I had to summon Minister Dokora to come and explain to me what they are doing to address such problems because this cannot be allowed to continue as at the end of the day we
are paying that teacher for doing nothing," he said.
Moyo said government's aim was to ensure that by next year the anomaly would have been resolved. The issue of non-Ndebele speaking teachers has been brought up at a number of forums, with the latest being a workshop on indigenous languages and non-fiction writing organised by the Zimbabwe
Academic and Non-fiction Authors Association.
In a statement the ministry said Dokora is currently attending the global partnership for education conference in Belgium he left the country on 23 May.
Last week, Senior minister of State in the President's Office Simon Khaya Moyo summoned Dokora over engaging of non-Ndebele speaking teachers in the Matabeleland region
The matter has for the past couple of weeks raised the ire of a number of academics, pressure groups and parents who blamed the policy for contributing to the low pass rate in primary schools in the region.
Moyo told a local newspaper that he raised the issue with Dokora as it had become a concern to people in Matabeleland region.
"He promised that he will work on it and that he will soon work on modalities to have more Ndebele speaking teachers deployed in the region," he said.
Khaya Moyo said it did not make sense to have a teacher who could not even pronounce a single Ndebele word teaching Grade One pupils in Matabeleland.
"It boggles the mind that you find a teacher in Matabeleland who cannot even say salibonani, litshonanjani, then expect them to teach a pupil that very same language. It is just like a blind person leading another blind person, in such a situation
can we say this teacher is teaching or cheating.
"That is the reason I had to summon Minister Dokora to come and explain to me what they are doing to address such problems because this cannot be allowed to continue as at the end of the day we
are paying that teacher for doing nothing," he said.
Moyo said government's aim was to ensure that by next year the anomaly would have been resolved. The issue of non-Ndebele speaking teachers has been brought up at a number of forums, with the latest being a workshop on indigenous languages and non-fiction writing organised by the Zimbabwe
Academic and Non-fiction Authors Association.
Source - zbc
