News / National
Furore over non deployment of Kalanga teachers
03 Jan 2021 at 02:39hrs | Views
The Kalanga Language and Cultural Development Association(KLCDA) has expressed concern over failure by the government to deploy Kalanga teachers in Kalanga communities after graduation.
The organisation said this had resulted in a disappointing response to a recently flighted advert by hillside Teachers Training College calling for applications for students interested in the teacher training course with specialisation in Tjikalanga language.
The association's head of publicity, Divine Dube (pictured below), told Sunday Southern eye that the limited applications for Tjikalanga reflects existential Kalanga challenges.
"While it is common knowledge that the low turnout of students in teacher training institutions across the country is not only peculiar to Tjikalanga, we would like to put it on record that the disappointing response to an advert flighted by the college recently, illustrates inherent issues that affect Tjikalanga as a historically disadvantaged language struggling to rise from systematic marginalisation since colonial times,'' Dube said.
He said the government was constitutionally responsible for the development of Tjikalanga materially or otherwise as it has done to Chi Shona and IsiNdebele, which continue to enjoy linguistic dominance at the expense of other official indigenous languages.
Dube said they had supported the training of hundreds of Kalanga teachers with the hope that they would be employed in the relevant areas after graduation but only that a few of them had been employed.
He urged the government to ensure that teachers are paid decent remuneration adding that their plight dissuades would-be teachers from joining the profession.
There are 16 official languages spoken in Zimbabwe and Lupane State University is the first institution of higher learning in the country to introduce Kalanga as a degree programme.
The organisation said this had resulted in a disappointing response to a recently flighted advert by hillside Teachers Training College calling for applications for students interested in the teacher training course with specialisation in Tjikalanga language.
The association's head of publicity, Divine Dube (pictured below), told Sunday Southern eye that the limited applications for Tjikalanga reflects existential Kalanga challenges.
"While it is common knowledge that the low turnout of students in teacher training institutions across the country is not only peculiar to Tjikalanga, we would like to put it on record that the disappointing response to an advert flighted by the college recently, illustrates inherent issues that affect Tjikalanga as a historically disadvantaged language struggling to rise from systematic marginalisation since colonial times,'' Dube said.
Dube said they had supported the training of hundreds of Kalanga teachers with the hope that they would be employed in the relevant areas after graduation but only that a few of them had been employed.
He urged the government to ensure that teachers are paid decent remuneration adding that their plight dissuades would-be teachers from joining the profession.
There are 16 official languages spoken in Zimbabwe and Lupane State University is the first institution of higher learning in the country to introduce Kalanga as a degree programme.
Source - the standard
