Angry Ndebele people demand more teacher training in Zimbabwe

Lack of teacher training colleges in Zimbabwe's southern regions has raised tribal and political tensions as the minority Ndebele group resists the deployment of teachers from President Robert Mugabe's Shona tribe.
Most teacher training colleges are concentrated in areas dominated by the Shona, creating a shortage of Ndebele teachers to cater for schools in the south.
Some residents in the southern regions - second city Bulawayo, Matabeleland North and Matabeleland South provinces - have agitated for breaking away from Zimbabwe on the grounds of being deliberately sidelined and undermined by Mugabe's government.
However, secession demands have been thwarted and some individuals have been charged with treason over the years.
Zimbabwe's new Constitution acknowledges 16 languages but Shona remains dominant, creating tensions in some areas as parents resist their children - especially in early grades - being taught by people who do not speak their mother language.
In an interview Jabulani Sibanda, leader of veterans of the 1970s war of independence, the Zimbabwe National Liberation War Veterans' Association, said the problem was that the country was training more teachers in other provinces.
Sibanda, who comes from the affected southern region and is also a fierce Mugabe loyalist, said the issue was not tribal but emanated from a lack of teacher training in those regions.
"We do not have a single teacher college in Matabeleland North; Matabeleland South has only one." In contrast, the southern Masvingo province had three teacher colleges and a technical college and Manicaland in the east had two teacher colleges and a polytechnic.
Trouble brewing
The problem of the lack of Ndebele teachers has seen some citizens taking the law into their own hands to force government to build colleges in their region that will cater for the Ndebele.
Recently seven people appeared in the Plumtree magistrate's court after storming Makuzeze Primary School and demanding that Headteacher Victoria Pasipanodya leave, saying they wanted Ndebeles to be trained and take her place.
Last month the Ministry of Education said it would probe the matter - but the investigation was shelved seemingly because of political pressure.
Zimbabwe's southern regions have always complained of being marginalised and claim that it is because they come from a minority group - descendents of the Zulus in South Africa who fell out with King Shaka in the early 19th century and headed north, conquering and assimilating other clans along the way and ending up in what is now southern Zimbabwe.
They also cite the collapse and relocation of most industries in Bulawayo. Before independence in 1980, Bulawayo was the country's industrial hub, but it has lost its status.
Statistics from the 2012 national census show that the unemployment rate is highest in Bulawayo province followed by Matabeleland North and then Matabeleland South.
Quotas?
Last year, University World News reported that the National University of Science and Technology, which is located in Bulawayo, was considering introducing a student quota system, arguing that students from other regions had been getting the bulk of places at the institution.
At that time Mbuso Fuzwayo, director of a local pressure group, was quoted as saying that he believed the quota system should be implemented because the university was not adequately meeting the needs of its environs.
"The bulk of students come from elsewhere and after studies they go back to their homes. We must have children from here who will serve our province after their studies," Fuzwayo said.
Mugabe has dismissed claims that his government deliberately undermines the Matabeleland provinces, but those sentiments run deep and in successive polls people in Ndebele regions have voted against him - his Zanu-PF party lost all parliamentary and council seats in Bulawayo in last year's general elections.