Bulawayo City Council has blamed the move by the government to ban collection of special levies at schools for delays in construction of early childhood development (ECD) classes at its schools.
NQOBANI NDLOVU STAFF REPORTER
A nine-year primary education programme will be mandatory beginning next year following the introduction of ECD A and B catering for three to five-year- olds.
According to the council’s latest Health, Education and Housing committee council report, the local authority is financially hamstrung to build new classroom blocks for ECD learners.
Schools were for example resorting to civvies days — that were banned in February — to raise money.
“A number of the council schools wished to embark on the construction of ECD blocks,” part of the council report reads.
“At the present moment it was the parents-teacher associations (PTAs), which had been putting up any extra buildings in the schools including building of normal school classrooms and administration blocks.
“The snag, however, was that the PTAs were now handicapped as the government froze the collections of any special levies to carry out developmental projects for the current year.
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“It was not known when this freeze would be lifted.
“Without collection of special levies, it became virtually impossible for schools to carry out any meaningful projects on their own.”
The council said it would take nearly three years to build the new classroom blocks at its 29 schools.
“It was therefore proposed that council prioritised the construction of the ECD blocks,” the report added.
“However, since council was also facing financial challenges, it was proposed that at least 10 ECD blocks be built in 10 schools per year.
“This would take three years to construct ECD blocks in all the 29 schools run by the council.”
