Friday, March 29, 2024

Heavy rains continue to reign havoc: School infrastructure in Lumezi destroyed

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Heavy rains have damaged school infrastructure and disadvantaged over One thousand pupils in Lumezi district from attending classes.

Lumezi District Education Board Secretary (DEBS) Levy Matongo has noted with concern that the rains has damaged classroom blocks and staff houses in four schools in the district.

ZANIS reports that the DEBS revealed the development after conducting a damage assessment tour of the affected schools in the plateau and the valley areas of the district.

“At Chasera here we have 547 pupils that have been affected, at Katunulu primary 450 learners are affected while at Kamo primary 309 pupils have been disadvantaged,” the DEBS lamented.

Mr Matongo explained that the heavy storm damaged the roof of a 1 by 2 classroom blocks at Chasera Primary, at Kamo primary and at Katunala primary schools while 3 staff houses at Kachunga primary school have had their roofs blown off.

He has described the damage to the schools as disastrous.

“We have visited all the affected schools and the damage is disastrous and it has disadvantaged our learners and damaged examination centers,” he said.

The DEBS is, however, pleased that head teachers in the affected schools have started offering lessons in sessions so as to accommodate pupils in examination classes.

“I am happy with the quick action by the school administrations to start having classes in sessions so that every pupil is attended to,” Mr Matongo said.

And Chasera Primary School Head Teacher Robin Manda has called on the church to open the places of worship to schools that have been damaged by heavy rains.

He mentioned that pupil attendance has dropped because learners are shunning classes as they are learning around the school yard.

“The attendance of pupils has been affected by this and some pupils have lost hope already, but we thank the RCZ church for allowing us to use their place and we hope more churches will do the same,” Mr Manda said.

And Lumezi District Commissioner Emmanuel Mulenga, who is also Area Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit (DMMU) chairperson said the committee has received the report of the damaged school infrastructure and meetings are being held to help find a solution to the challenge.

7 COMMENTS

  1. Ni cheap PF infrastructure that was used to steal money. Lungu has stolen billions of USDs and has now failed to pay.
    Tasila could fence a forest from stolen money while schools are crumbling! Without shame, Lungu still wants to be president, no way!

  2. This is due to poor architecture and structural engineering. I have got a structure under construction and 95% finished that survived the early rain storms less than a week ago while the seemingly properly constructed impossing structures roofs were ripped off. My personal research on how a structure can stand damaging rain storms paid off. I am not even a civil engineer, however, in something else. In our country, Zambia, there’s just too much cowboy architectural and engineering approach to anything. No wonder the government and private companies give construction projects to the Chinese companies who deliver not only in time but also on quality with very high standards.

  3. It’s sad that the students are disrupted by this disaster. However, it’s very impressive to see how the onset of the rains this year has come in so quickly. Hoping this will help our national food basket. Otherwise may God protect everyone from stories of lightening striking people and roofs being blown off.

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