This year 2008 should go down in history as a year in which the Zimbabwe education system came to its knees. It should be recorded as a no-show year. All the gains that the country accrued after independence are being reversed, and that is sad Samson Chivanga, a secondary school teacher in the capital, Harare (IRIN).
The crisis is only compounded by drought and a growing HIV/AIDS epidemic, as illness and hunger have become added burdens that are keeping children out of school. Children are not the only ones not attending school in recent years as it is estimated that some 45,000 teachers have quit since 2004.
HIV/AIDS has begun to take its toll on children across the country, not only as victims, but as primary caregivers for their ailling relatives. Children are forced out of school to care for their sick parents. Not only are children burdened with picking up the slack for a failing healthcare system, they are often forced to work to support the family by finding work on the streets peddling or taking up other work to supply the household income.
For almost six months now, John Mberi*, 14, from the high-density suburb of Mufakose in Zimbabwe's capital, Harare, has been taking care of his sick mother… Taking care of his ailing mother has been very difficult for John, and he often misses school when her condition is worse. On days like this he has to wash, cook, clean and bathe his mother in bed using a bucket of water. (PulseNews)
According to the Coalition Against Child Labour and Abuse in Zimbabwe, in only one year, 2007 to 2008, the number of children working aged 5 to 17 years old, has increase 15%, from 60% to 75%. HIV/AIDS, which is dubed as the country's unparalleled economic crisis, has caused the complete brakedown of support networks for suffering families is largely to blame for both the increase of child labor and the decrease of children attending school. According to UNICEF one in five children children in Zimbabwe have lost a parent due to AIDS.
“The year 2008 clearly shows that child labour is on the increase, not only in Harare, but throughout the country. The use of minors in employment that is detrimental to them has reached saddening proportions,” said CPS information officer Shemiah Nyaude. (IRIN)
How extensive is the crisis? The Food and Agricultural Organisation and World Food Program, released a report in June 2008, which projected that some 5.1 million Zimbabweans, almost half the country's population will be victims of food insecurity by early 2009 (IRIN). Therefore with the extent of children being orphaned, removed from school to care for ill relatives or work on the streets, and the extreme level of the food crisis, it appears that the future for the children of Zimbabwe is one with a heavy burden to carry down a long and treacherous road.
Please see my previous posts on children in Zimbabwe here, for more information.