EDUCATION IN ZIMBABWE .......

My early primary school years

I started my primary education at a remote rural school in Mutoko, Zimbabwe, in the early 1970s. The civil war in Zimbabwe had only just begun and no one was sure where the country was heading in terms of the war.

Most school children came from distant villages and were walking barefoot to get to school. Most ran the danger of running into 'Rhodesian forces' on the one hand or 'guerilla freedom fighters' on the other, in the dark and scary forests which they had to pass through.

At night, I as well as members of my family and many other of my school mates attended overnight vigils where the freedom fighters taught us about the war, and how our lives would change for the better if they won the war. I remember getting excited that after the war and after getting an education we would get better homes, earn a lot of money and avoid a life of working the fields for very long hours. This purged us on - everyone at my school soldiered on with the same purpose. We knew first hand the hard life led by African children - we wanted a better life after the war. Each one of us at that rural school longed for a blissful life.

In that day and age life was hard, especially if you lived in a rural area. It was hard getting the basic things of life – food, water, books, school uniforms, shoes, pens or pencils. That remote part of Mutoko was and still is drought prone, nothing much came out of agricultural practices, so most families were poor. Hardships were evident all over the landscape – hardships caused by persistent droughts, low rainfall, extreme temperatures, poor soils and an ongoing civil war. There was very little hope in the land. During the farming season, most fields had drought stricken crops shrivelling under the sizzling African heat. The only hope laid in getting an education.

Homesteads were constructed on sandy patches of land and built of pole, dagga and thatch. Even the thatching grass was hard to come by in such a drought prone region. A majority of children came from such homesteads to attend school. I remember seeing a few dotted houses built of brick and mortar under iron roofing. Such houses belonged to those with a little bit of money. A majority of school children came from poor backgrounds and some of my young school friends were forced into early marriages because of this poverty.

Some of my classmates doubled as a cattle herders in their spare time. My two friends, Sarah and Rosewitta (names changed) who belonged to a certain religious sect had been married off at a tender age to polygamous husbands. Even though the two girls had been forced into early marriages they were still attending school. What future did Sarah and Rosewitta have? I wondered. What future did did we all have in this war torn country?

I had started my first year of primary education in 1973. Two years after that my siblings and I left the school because the civil war had intensified. I left behind all my classmates who had nowhere else to go. I left behind Sarah and Rosewitta. Years later, the war situation turned for the worst, and that school was closed. I don't know what happened to most of my school mates, whether they continued with their education or not.

(written in support of the work done by Charity Hope Trust. Find them on www.charityhope.org.uk)