Defaulting Insuza parents punished

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PARENTS and guardians failing to pay tuition fees at Hlanganani Primary school in Insuza, Matabeleland North, are allegedly being forced to do community service at the institution.

PARENTS and guardians failing to pay tuition fees at Hlanganani Primary school in Insuza, Matabeleland North, are allegedly being forced to do community service at the institution.

BY NQOBANI NDLOVU

The school development committee (SDC), with the assistance of community leaders, reportedly threatened to seize livestock over unpaid tuition fees or force defaulters to do community service.

The community service duties include moulding bricks, slashing grass or clearing the school ground to recover the unpaid fees which are set at $20 per term, Southern Eye was told.

“This has been going on for a while,” Mxolisi Ndlovu, a former councillor, said.

Lazarus Dokora
Lazarus Dokora

“The villagers are struggling just like everybody else in the country and this has seen the school resorting to such measures to recover its monies.

“The parents and guardians choose to undertake community service than risk losing their livestock.”

Ndlovu claimed that the village heads were sometimes threatening to drag defaulters to traditional courts. Insuza Ward 11 councillor Tapson Moyo also confirmed the development in an interview.

“The SDC is working with the community leaders to ensure that all parents and guardians with children at Hlanganani Primary School pay tuition fees,” he said.

“This has seen parents being forced to do piece jobs at the school for a certain period of time commensurate with the $20 per term school fees.”

The school head, a Mr Simango, could not be reached for comment.

Many schools countrywide are engaging debt collectors to attach property belonging to parents over unpaid fees. The government has outlawed the chasing away of children from school over unpaid fees.

Primary and Secondary Education minister Lazarus Dokora has said parents who default in paying fees for their children would have opened themselves up to civil suits by schools for failing to meet their parental obligations.

Dokora said local education was not free, remarks that infuriated parents.