The CCAP Synod of Livingstonia has given government a July 31 deadline to provide the usual grant aid to its five special needs schools or it will be forced to send 400 students packing.
In a statement seen by The Daily Times and addressed to the Ministry of Education Science and Technology, Education Secretary for the Synod Reverend Timothy Nyasulu accuses government of lacking seriousness on special needs scholars in the country, adding that the development is violating children’s rights.
The Synod also accuses the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration of failure to train enough special needs teachers and send them to schools that are understaffed.
“The Synod education commission constructed special needs schools which are then jointly supported by government through Ministry of Education Science and Technology with a key purpose of mutual partnership in delivering education services. Thus all special schools are grant aided; meaning the school will be supported by government. By virtual of being grant aided, the schools are supposed to be included in the government annual budget for the operations and government is supposed to be sending teachers, but this is not happening,” reads the statement.
The statement states that the Synod has a total of 24 teachers against 400 pupils at Bandawe Primary and Embangweni Secondary schools for the deaf and Ekwendeni and Nyungwe schools for the visually impaired in Mzimba and Karonga districts, respectively.
Nyasulu confirmed the statement, adding that writing the Ministry was the second step after failing to get, tangible response at their last meeting in June this year.
Said it is a pity that as Malawi celebrates 51years of independent government only relies on Catholic Montfort Teachers Training College that trains 99 special needs teachers per year. He said the college fails to meet the demand for teachers in all special needs schools in the country adding that establishing a government college could help minimise the shortage of teachers.
Ministry spokesperson Manfred Ndovie said the erratic grants in many schools in the country were because of shortage of funds at the Treasury. But he said the ministry has been given enough funds for special needs schools in this new financial year and that grants would be sent to the schools.
“We know about the problem of shortage of teachers in special needs schools and the ministry is seriously looking into that,” he said.
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