NewZimbabwe.com
3 November 2011
The Zimbabwe government, the United Nations and other Western donors have launched an US$85 million education fund aimed at improving education in the country’s secondary schools.
The donation will pay for seven million textbooks, and follows a similar project last year in which UNICEF and other agencies donated 13 million textbooks worth US$50 million to the country’s primary schools.
The programme also will target 200,000 absentee children from the most impoverished and vulnerable communities.
Zimbabwe’s educational system was once a model in the region, but a decade of economic decline and lengthy strikes by teachers deprived millions of children of schooling and decimated teaching aids.
Despite the setbacks, aid agencies say Zimbabwe still has a 92 percent literacy rate – one of the bright spots of Mugabe’s 31-year-old rule.
UNICEF representative Peter Salama said Thursday that the US$85 million fund aims to provide a textbook for every child in the country’s 2,300 secondary schools.
“This second phase will focus on equity and access to quality education for all children,” Salama, Unicef country representative, said at the launch in Harare.
Education Minister David Coltart, Vice President John Nkomo and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai both attended the launch.
UNICEF said the Zimbabwean government, donor countries and the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa all contributed to the fund.