Zimbabwe Independent

8 February 2013

ONE of the areas where President Robert Mugabe registered significant success, acknowledged even by his trenchant critics during his otherwise disastrous rule which ruined the country and impoverished the people, is education.

When Mugabe came to power in 1980 he inherited solid education infrastructure and a strong base, one of the best in Africa, and expanded on it to provide access for millions of the formerly marginalised and underprivileged majority.

Education in public institutions was made free allowing millions of previously disadvantaged children to go to school, and in the process huge inequities from the colonial era were diminished.

Education was also declared a basic human right in the new non-racial system which followed majority rule. Alongside other critical social services, education was subsidised and this helped Zimbabwe to achieve phenomenal results in a bid to eliminate illiteracy, ignorance and poverty.

As a result Zimbabwe achieved the highest literacy rate in Africa ahead of countries like Tunisia, giving its people a good start in life and laying a strong foundation for national development.

Evidently education is essential for everyone. It helps people earn a living, respect and recognition. It is thus an indispensable part of life. It is thus difficult to imagine life without enlightenment, a key element of civilisation of human society.

However, that remaining element and symbol of Mugabe’s achievement before his tsunami-style devastation of the nation in the decade preceding 2009 is now dramatically unravelling, risking wiping out whatever remains of his positive legacy. Whatever he achieved at the height of his rule pales in comparison to the alarming destruction his corrupt and incompetent regime inflicted on the country.

If ever there was more evidence needed to prove the disintegration of the education sector it was provided by Ordinary Level results released this week. Results released on Monday showed 81,6% of the 172 698 students who sat for the examinations last year failed to pass at least five subjects with grade C or better. Only 31 767 of that number made it, translating to a pathetic 18,4% pass rate, the trend since 2009.

While there are many reasons to explain this appalling trend, Education minister David Coltart on Tuesday captured the gist of it when he said the poor results were a reflection of the “extreme crisis in education experienced between approximately 2005 and 2009”.

The reality is that schoolchildren who failed exams are victims of a situation beyond their control. Granted, their personal input counts but students at all levels of the education system are still battling to recover from the consequences of the economic meltdown and political instability before 2009.

At the height of the crisis, schools were forced to close down as there were no teachers, no books and therefore no lessons, leaving thousands of children stranded.

Only those with money managed to hire private teachers or tutors, while the majority languished without educators. Most teachers left the profession and even country due to the economic crisis. Even though schools re-opened in 2009 the devastating impact and ramifications of the virtual collapse of the sector are still being felt up to today, leaving Mugabe’s legacy further in tatters.

ESPN Cricinfo

By Firdose Moonda

7 February 2013

Andy Flower, the former Zimbabwe captain and current England team director, has spoken openly about his black armband protest at the 2003 World Cup to mark 10 years since he and Henry Olonga stood against “the death of democracy” in Zimbabwe.

Flower reflected on the events of February 10, 2003, in Harare, when Zimbabwe played Namibia, in a BBC Radio 5 Live programme and spoke in detail for the first time about what prompted him to don the armband. He said that “given the same circumstances,” he would “without a doubt,” do it again.

During one of Zimbabwe’s worst periods of oppression in the early 2000s, a friend of Flower’s, Nigel Huff, took him to see the devastation on his farm caused by land reform. He also told Flower the national cricket team had a “moral obligation not to go about business as usual during the World Cup but to tell the world what was going on in Zimbabwe.”

Flower approached Olonga for two reasons. He thought Olonga would have “the courage of his convictions to take a stand,” and wanted to have two people of different races making the same protest. “I also thought the fact that it would be one white Zimbabwean and one black one operating together gave the message the most eloquent balance,” Flower said.

Together with David Coltart, then a human rights lawyer and now the country’s minister of sports, education, arts and culture, the idea of armbands was conceived. Nobody in the team or elsewhere knew what Flower and Olonga were going to do until the morning of their opening match against Namibia.

Before play, a statement was handed to the media containing details of the symbolism in their gesture. It contained an explanation: “Although we are just professional cricketers, we do have a conscience and feelings. We believe that if we remain silent that will be taken as a sign that either we do not care or we condone what is happening in Zimbabwe. We believe that it is important to stand up for what is right.

“In doing so we are making a silent plea to those responsible to stop the abuse of human rights in Zimbabwe.”

A copy of the statement is framed and hangs in Flower’s study where he occasionally re-reads it. “I love the way it was written – the meaning in some of those sentences is very sad because it is a reminder of what was happening in that country at that time and some of the people who went through agony and lost their lives,” he said.

During his interview with Alison Mitchell, she asked him to read it aloud and he did. She recalled that he “struggled to keep his voice from cracking,” and “the emotion was evident in his eyes.”

Although Flower said he knew his international career would end and he would have to leave Zimbabwe, Olonga thought his life would go on in his homeland. “I had in my own naivety thought I could carry on in Zimbabwe – maybe my career would come to an end but I could still live there. But that all changed when I got death threats two or three weeks after the World Cup. I realised the game was up,” Olonga said.

Olonga now lives in England where he works as a singer and public speaker. He would like to return to Zimbabwe with his wife and two daughters but would “need some guarantees that people who wanted to harm me a few years ago do not still want to harm me,” he said.

Flower would also like to return and hopes to go back to a better place. “We can’t all change the world, but if we all do little things along the way and make the most powerful decisions we can then I think we can bring about change,” he said.

Andy’s brother, Grant, is the current Zimbabwe’s batting coach so the family connection with the national team remains. However, Grant he will not travel to West Indies on the forthcoming tour because of what ZC termed a “technical change” to their structure.

Daily News

By Nyasha Chingono

7 February 2013

Government remains the biggest threat to the development of the education sector, a Cabinet minister has said.

Education minister David Coltart has blamed the poor pass rate recorded for last year’s ‘O’ Level examinations on warped government priorities, which have seen ministers and top officials getting luxury cars while public schools remain underfunded.

Coltart said while commendable pass rates have been recorded in Grade 7 and ‘A’ Level examinations between 2009 and 2012, his ministry achieved the feat on a tight budget supported mainly by donors.

“This gradual overall progress has been achieved in an environment of minimal government funding for education outside of the payment of teachers. While donor support through the Education Transition Fund has been generous, it has been small compared to the amount of donor support the education sector got in the 1980s,” Coltart wrote on his Facebook wall.

He said in one year alone in the 1980s, the United States government — a major donor — would contribute over $100 million to Zimbabwe’s education sector. That support has dwindled to $1 million since he took over as minister in 2009.

“No support whatsoever has been forthcoming for the second phase of the Education Transition Fund from that quarter,” Coltart said.

During the economic meltdown experienced between 2003 and 2009, the education sector suffered as qualified teachers left the country for greener pastures due to poor salaries.

“The damage done to the education sector by the chaos of the last decade and underfunding for two decades is incalculable but we see the effects through these low pass rates,” Coltart wrote.

Residents in Bulawayo have criticised teachers for the poor results, saying their children’s future looked bleak.

One irate parent, Priscilla Mtombeni, said: “Teachers are not committed to our children, but are busy syphoning cash from us for extra lessons which do not translate into good results.”

Cosmas Ndlovu, a high school teacher, blamed the poor pass rate on students’ obsession with mobile phones and Internet, saying these affected studies.

Last year’s ‘O’ Level results reveal that the pass rate dropped by 1,1 percent.

Daily News

By Blessings Mashaya

7 February 2013

Sports minister David Coltart yesterday announced the new Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) board, returning lawyer Joseph James as chairperson.

Bulawayo-based James, a former lower league football player, will lead the eight-member board of the country’s supreme sport governing association.

Experienced athletics administrator Edward Siwela has also been retained from the previous board, whose term of office expired last year.

Obediah Moyo, a former Chef de Mission of the Zimbabwe Paralympics team, also stays on from the previous administration.

Between 1985 and 1987, Moyo was a member of the old Zimbabwe Sports and Recreation Council that gave way to the Sports Commission.

Moyo has special interest in people with disabilities and holds a master’s degree in international relations.

Former Zimbabwe Cricket boss Dave Ellman-Brown has also kept his seat on the board.

Former Hockey Association of Zimbabwe president Aaron Kanyangarara and ex-national team captain Aaron Kanyangarara, former Zimbabwe Ladies Golf Union president Jessie Nyakatawa, Zimbabwe Rugby Union vice-president Aisha Tsimba and former teacher Miriam Mushayi are the new members on the board.

“I am pleased to announce, having consulted with His Excellency the President R.G. Mugabe who has given his approval, the appointment in terms of Section 5 of the Sports and Recreation Commission Act of the new SRC board,” Coltart posted on his Facebook wall yesterday.

“Their appointment is with effect from the 6th February 2013 for a period of three years,” he added.

The Zimbabwean

By Edgar Gweshe

7 February 2013

The low investment in the country’s education sector for the past years is largely to blame for the poor Ordinary Level results recorded this year, according to The Minister of Education, Sport Arts and Culture, David Coltart.

“The real cause of this is the lack of investment in education. Since 2009, we haven’t had teachers, textbooks and the libraries are not properly functional.

Also, many school buildings are not safe places for learning and all these factors have far greater impact on the education of children,” said Coltart.

Out of a total of 172 698 students who sat for the Ordinary Level exams last year, only 31 767 students managed to get five subjects and above.

The results mean that 81,6 percent of the students failed. Last year the percentage of students who failed was 80,5 percent. Since 2003, the Zimbabwe Schools Examinations Council has not recorded a 25 percent pass rate.

Last year, the percentage pass rate was 18,4 percent out of 268 854 students who sat for the exams. In 2008, the pass rate was 14,4 percent.

Coltart was addressing a press conference in the capital where he was briefed about the Zimbabwe Rural Schools Library Trust by the Chairperson, Matthew Chandavengerwa.

The ZRSLT is an initiative that aims to establish libraries in rural schools.

Coltart said the exodus of experienced teachers who left the country at the height of Zimbabwe’s economic decline had taken its toll on the country’s educational sector. Zimbabwe lost around 20 000 teachers between 2004 and 2009.

“Between 2007 and 2008, we lost many teachers most of whom were teaching critical subjects such as English, Maths and Science and if anyone thinks we can achieve the same results without these teachers, then they lack an understanding of the education sector,” said Coltart.

He added: “These results were not inevitable and we are not out of the woods yet. It’s like a patient being told you are HIV positive and it’s so devastating but it’s not the end of the story because you can still get on ARV treatment and get better.

These results explain that we have a problem and we have to move forward.”

Coltart said he had instructed ZIMSEC to maintain high marking standards for the Ordinary Level examinations adding this could have affected a lot of students.

“I instructed them (ZIMSEC) not to lower the standards in any way. In South Africa they have lowered their standards but that does not give you the accurate picture of the results,” he said.

Meanwhile, Coltart commended the ZRSLT saying the move will go a long way in alleviating shortages of reading material in most rural schools.

“This is a very big initiative on the revitalisation of our education system. It is a tragic fact that rural libraries have not been properly functioning for the past two decades. Most books were worn out and no new books were purchased,” said Coltart.

The Times

By Alison Mitchell

7 February 2013

Ten years later, the ‘comrades’ who drew attention to the plight of their nation remain convinced it was the right move

Andy Flower is struggling — but just about succeeding — to stop his voice from breaking up. He is carefully and deliberately reading aloud from a sheet of A4 paper, which he holds in both hands in front of him, as he sits in a quiet corner of a Buckinghamshire country house hotel. After he delivers the last line, there is silence. He glances up at me and his eyes are brimful of emotion.

England’s team director has just read out loud, for the first time in a decade, the statement that he and Henry Olonga, his fellow Zimbabwean, arranged to be distributed to the world’s media at 9.30am on February 10, 2003, declaring that the two of them would be wearing black armbands during Zimbabwe’s matches at the cricket World Cup to “mourn the death of democracy” in their country and to protest against human rights abuses being committed under the regime of President Robert Mugabe.

“They’re very powerful words,” he proffers eventually. “It’s an emotional moment to read those words again.”

It is ten years since Flower and Olonga undertook their high-risk protest. The World Cup was taking place against a backdrop of violence in Zimbabwe, much of it at the hands of Mugabe’s Zanu (PF) henchmen who had been charged with enforcing the Government’s controversial fast-track land reform scheme, resulting in white farmers being forced off their land and out of their homes, often without notice or compensation.

While Olonga has spoken and written extensively about the protest — the secret meetings leading up to it, the angst of the decision-making and the depth of the personal consequences — Flower has never talked about it in detail until now, to mark the anniversary of an event that changed his life, and that of Olonga, for ever.

Flower was the greatest Zimbabwe cricketer in history, a former captain and a highly influential figure, while Olonga was the first black cricketer to play for the country. Together, as one white man and one black man, they made a political stance against a tyrannical regime in a way no sportsmen had done before.

In the stressful aftermath of the protest, Olonga received death threats before fleeing to England, where he still lives, having forged a career as a singer and public speaker. Flower already had a job lined up at Essex County Cricket Club, meaning that he left Zimbabwe with his young family soon after the World Cup, before going on to coach England, winning famous Ashes victories home and away, and taking them to No 1 in the world.

Neither man has set foot in Zimbabwe since. My interview with Flower for Radio 5 Live came at the end of a long day of ECB meetings, but he spent more than an hour recapping an event that will always play a part in defining him. It was an intense experience listening to his story and watching emotions stir in him, after they had lain close to the surface, yet hidden for so long.

“The meeting I remember most clearly was in David Coltart’s [human rights lawyer] study, and we sat down and wrote the statement,” he says. “It was David who came up with the idea of having a symbol. The black armband was traditionally a symbol of mourning or paying respect to someone, but in this instance it was mourning the death of democracy in our country, and we wanted that message to go the media and to go out to those who might listen around the world; that democracy was dying in our country, and because of that, human rights abuses were occurring.

“There certainly was fear. It was a very nervy time for us. We’d be ending our cricket careers and ending our lives in Zimbabwe which was a very emo-tional thing to do. Security told us we’d be safe during the World Cup, what with media attention, but after the World Cup there would be ‘an accident’ — a burglary that went wrong or a hit and run on the street.”

The idea of a protest was suggested to Flower by Nigel Huff, a farmer friend who took Flower to see the state of disrepair that his land and the surrounding community had fallen into. Olonga and Flower were not close friends so it was a surprise to Olonga to receive a phone call from Flower, requesting a meeting in a local shopping centre, where he was asked if he would take part in a protest.

Olonga was only 26 at the time of the protest, engaged to be married, and had arguably more to lose than his senior team-mate, who had already decided to retire from international cricket at the end of the World Cup.

“I had a very direct e-mail threat [after the first match] saying, ‘we’re going to sort you out — we’re going to kill you,’ ” Olonga says. “That obviously made me realise I didn’t see myself having a future in Zimbabwe. The final nail in the coffin, though, was the day before the final match. I got an e-mail from my former fiancée saying she was ending the relationship.”

Despite the difficulties he faced, Olonga maintains he has never felt any regret about joining Flower in the protest. “I don’t hold anything against Andy,” Olonga says. “He approached me for a just cause that I believed in. I’d do it again.”

The relationship between the two men is an intriguing part of the story. They have never been close, despite the fact they will for ever be linked by this one significant event. Olonga describes them as “comrades” rather than friends, a term that brings a rueful nod from Flower.

“In our playing time there were certain tensions between us,” Flower admits. “We’ve seen each other since and we occasionally keep in touch, but we aren’t the best of friends and we don’t see each other often. I know his wife, Tara, she’s a lovely lady. In fact, this interview has prompted me. I will definitely be calling him up to see how he’s getting on.”

If Olonga, who has not owned a valid passport since his Zimbabwean one expired, had the opportunity to return there, he says he would need government assurances that he would not be harmed. Flower is more confident that he could now travel there safely and his voice wavers for a second time when speaking about his children, who were all born in Zimbabwe but know little about it. He is desperate to take them back to their homeland.

Does Flower have any regrets about the protest or the way things turned out? “It was the right thing to do at the time,” he says. “We were very clear we couldn’t ignore what was happening. I would do it again, given the same circumstances.

“The number of people that contacted me after that protest was a clear indication that it had touched the hearts of a great number of Zimbabweans. If that brought a little hope, if that was an expression of their thoughts, feelings and sadness about what was happening in the country, expressed through our words and our symbols, then I think it was a good thing.”

“One of the key goals was to get the word out,” Olonga says. “We wanted the world to embrace that things were abnormal in Zimbabwe and do something about it.

“That was slightly disappointing. The powers that be on a higher level — the African Union, the UN, or whoever you want to appeal to — the people who had the real power to bring freedom, chose not to.”

Zimbabwe faces elections later this year but the signs are that the violence and turmoil that accompanied elections in 2008 are likely to be repeated. Olonga is hopeful but not optimistic that some change may come about.

“For a long time Zimbabwean people have not had their voice heard,” he says. “Zimbabwe needs someone fresh. Someone who can embrace the challenges the country is facing. Someone who can deal with the past honestly, who can hold those accountable who have abused people, and who can turn the thing around.

“I’m not anti Zanu (PF). I just want the people to have someone who represents them as a servant. You’re supposed to make people’s lives better.”

The Herald

by Ellina Mhlanga

7 February 2013

THE Minister of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture, David Coltart, has appointed a new Sports Commission board that will run the country’s supreme sports regulatory body for the next three years with Joseph James retaining his position as the chairman.

The previous board’s term of office expired last year in October. However, Bulawayo lawyer James will lead the eight-member board for another three years after his re-appointment yesterday.

Some of the board members who have been retained from the previous board are experienced athletics administrator Edward Siwela, Jasmine Nyakatawa from golf, Obedia Moyo, who is also from golf, and former cricket administrator David Ellman-Brown.

They will be joined by Farai Kanyangarara, the former president of Hockey Association of Zimbabwe. Kanyangarara also captained the men’s hockey team at the All-Africa Games in 2003 and has extensive experience in the sport.

Aisha Tsimba, who is a lawyer and works at a local bank, is another new member. Tsimba is the former chairperson for Zimbabwe women’s rugby and has also been on the Premier Soccer League disciplinary committee.

Miriam Mushayi, a former teacher, completes the board. She holds a Masters in social policy and has qualifications in human resources. The new three new members replaces Eugenia Chidhakwa, Mark Manolois and Obed Dube. In his announcement of the new board, Coltart said he had consulted with President Mugabe before settling for the eight commissioners.

“I am pleased to announce, having consulted with His Excellency the President R.G Mugabe who has given his approval the appointment in terms of section 5 of the SRC act of the new Sports and Recreation Commission board.

“I am very pleased with the Board. They are all people I wanted and the President (Mugabe) approved them all. There is a lot happening behind the scenes and much of it positive,” said Coltart on his Facebook wall yesterday.

Coltart said the board has a bigger task ahead as they are expected to address several issues that have been haunting local sport and prepare for forthcoming events such as the Zone Six Youth Games

“There are many challenges we are facing in sport, for example in football, and we are in a process of cleaning up football.

“The Asiagate report is still not being fully implemented and that is our primary responsibility.We also want to do whatever we can to restore professionalism to football and get additional funding.”

“The second objective is to prepare for the Zone Six Games Zimbabwe will be hosting in December 2014. Their (the Sports Commission board) immediate task is to appoint the local organising committee and the chief executive,” said Coltart.

The Education, Sport, Arts and Culture minister said there is need to rehabilitate sporting facilities ahead of the next year’s events.

“The third point is the rehabilitation of many of our sporting facilities, which is going to be a massive task for the next 18 months.

“We have been issued the right to host one of the Hockey World Series next year and in order to host that, we have been tasked to rehabilitate Magamba Stadium,” said Coltart.

Coltart said the new board also has to instil discipline in some of the national sporting associations that are failing to run their affairs properly.

“We have to tighten the administration of many sporting disciplines that are not being run well. There is need to instil discipline among the national associations. These are the four general points we are looking at,” said Coltart.

The minister said the coming in of new faces in the board is meant to bring in new ideas for the improvement of sport.

“The previous board performed very well and to those whose terms have not been extended they shouldn’t despair.

“They have served Zimbabwe very well. It was just necessary to bring (in) fresh blood and to get better regional and gender balance.

“I have brought in two women and one men based in Bulawayo. It’s also important to ensure continuity and experience,” he said

BBC Sport

By Sam Sheringham

7 February 2013

It was the moment that marked out Andy Flower and Henry Olonga as two of the most courageous figures in the history of their sport.

The Mercury

By Colleen Dardagan

6 February 2013

DESPITE the political and economic turmoil in Zimbabwe, UN research shows the country to be one of the most literate in Africa.

But teachers are paid half of what their counterparts in South Africa are. The government spends just R18 a child each month. School buildings are crumbling, yet the system continues to produce scientists, mathematicians and linguists accepted into universities in South Africa and all over the world.

In comparison, the South African Education Department spends R2 000 a month per child, according to departmental statistics. Teachers and schools are, in the main, well resourced, but the sector is dogged by controversy, inefficiency, watered-down standards and a woeful literacy rate as demonstrated by the Annual National Assessment tests last year.

Education analyst and development activist Graeme Bloch says despite the different histories of the two countries, which he says cannot be ignored, Zimbabwe could teach South Africa a lesson or two.

“They show you can still have a good education system and lousy politicians. They also prove that throwing money at the problem is not the answer. It’s about accountability.”

No Excuses.

Zimbabwe has its fair share of political and economic woes, but the standard of education at schools in the country has been remarkably consistent despite the upheavals. Teachers there have not played the blame game.

“It’s not about getting a certificate, but understanding the importance of learning.”

Zimbabwe’s teachers have not played the blame game, he says.

“They haven’t used the lack of resources or their political situation as an excuse and that’s why they do so well. Zimbabwe (education) is a lot better than us.”

In an exclusive interview with The Mercury, Zimbabwe’s Minister of Education, Sport and Recreation, David Coltart, spelled out the challenges, the triumphs and the fundamental passion which has kept the candle of learning burning bright in the pariah state’s 8 500 schools.

“The education foundation in Zimbabwe is very strong,” he says. “The system has been in place for over 50 years. There is a passion for learning in this country, discipline in our classrooms and a respect by pupils for their teachers.”

Coltart admits the sector is in crisis. Buildings and infrastructure have crumbled and teachers are underpaid.

“My department has the biggest budget, but we still spend a pathetically small amount on education. We did not have a teachers’ strike last year, but our relationship with them is still tenuous. They are paid less than half of what teachers are paid in South Africa.”

He said the country had “lost” 30 000 teachers, mostly to South Africa, during the “dark” years from 2007 to 2009.

“We have managed to put 15 000 teachers back into the system.” He describes them as “underqualified”, resulting in “poor outcomes”.

“But our teachers are in the classrooms. They are still teaching. It is a tribute to them. It is because of that very fact we can get the education system back to what it was in 1999 in less than five years. To me it’s what’s happening in the classroom that matters; the physical elements we can fix later.”

When asked to compare the education outcomes and standards between South Africa and Zimbabwe, Coltart pulls no punches.

“In the 1950s the policies in the two countries were diametrically opposed. In the then Southern Rhodesia, Sir Garfield Todd and his wife, Grace – who is an unsung hero – developed an outstanding curriculum. At the same time the nationalists in South Africa were devising Bantu education. In Southern Rhodesia – and eventually spreading to the whole of what became Rhodesia – education was open to all people. If you were black and clever you could make it to the top just like anyone else. In South Africa they wanted to keep black people as labourers. Even at the height of the war in Zimbabwe, education was never disrupted.”

He alludes to despot President Robert Mugabe’s first 10 years of office as a time when the government poured money into the existing system.

“Successive governments – and even to this day – also allowed missionary schools to run with what they were doing.” But, the seasoned politician and lawyer says what saved schools in the country, which for the past 20 years has seen its economy collapse, were parents.

“In South Africa parents were deliberately kept out of schools. You have a lost generation. In Zimbabwe there is a deep-rooted love for learning and during the years of trauma and crisis it was parents who sustained our schools because of that love. They paid their school fees in fuel, cooking oil, cabbages and meat. Those outside the country donated money back into the schools to keep them going.”

It is this ethic his department is working hard to retain.

“All over the world the trend now is to allow more autonomy and less government interference in schools. The success, particularly in the US and the UK, in turning around failing schools by adopting this strategy, is remarkable.”

He refers to a recent trip to America and the UK which he says was “eye-opening”.

And while Coltart says he takes the recently concluded United Nations Development Programme research finding, that Zimbabwe is the most literate coountry in Africa, with a “pinch of salt”, he says as the country began to collapse, autonomy was passed to parents and teachers which resulted in continuous graduates of a high standard.

“The UNDP research was only conducted among school going children. Only one third of the children who enrol in our schools successfully graduate. That is an alarming statistic which we are working hard to turn around,” he says.

But that number is concomitant in South African schools as departmental statistics in 2011 reveal two thirds of those enrolled here also dropped out before Grade 12.

This year, for the first time in years, says Coltart, parents struggled to find places for their children in the country’s schools.

“They are coming back, in numbers, it’s wonderful.”

The country still adheres to the Cambridge qualification which is assessed outside the country, and Coltart says “we have never fudged the figures”.

Standards

“As I understand from my colleagues in South Africa, your government has watered down the pass rate, probably for political reasons, and played around with the curriculum. When I came into office four years ago, I told my department categorically, they must not drop the pass standards or fiddle with the curriculum.”

He says the political turmoil in the country, particularly during electioneering, has had a devastating effect on more than 3 million schoolgoing children.

“As a result we have this bubble coming through where we are seeing standards plummet. Our distinction rate at A and O levels has also declined.”

Coltart says the country has levels of assessment which include an exam at the end of Grade 7 when the children leave primary school.

“If we had fudged the Grade 7 results we wouldn’t have realised the major crisis we were facing. Those children were going through primary school when teachers had no textbooks.

“The literacy and numeracy levels at that level are now shocking. But we have implemented policies to bring the level up with extra teaching. We have come up with solutions which are already beginning to make a difference. But, it is like a tsunami; the earthquake happened way back and now it is wreaking havoc.”

But he says teachers and parents remain the saviours.

“Zimbabwe’s education system is still in crisis, our teaching profession is still in crisis, but our strength is that passion and deep-rooted love of learning. Because of that it is not going to take a huge effort to get us back to the standards of 1999.”

Coltart’s overriding goal for this year is to extend the curriculum and restore teaching as a profession.

“We will definitely still follow the Cambridge system, but we want to bring in (information and communication technologies), better sport facilities, civic, environmental and vocational curricula.”

He describes the system as overly academic.

“You know if you are a scientist, a mathematician or linguist in Zimbabwe you will get a great education, even today. But if you want to be a mechanic, a toolmaker or go into manufacturing there’s nothing. That’s not good for our economy.”

Similarly, says Coltart, the graduates have served mainly the export market.

“All our top pupils have gone into universities in South Africa or elsewhere in the world and very few come back. That is also not good for us.”

With a system that still allows corporal punishment, Coltart says discipline at schools is impeccable, but there are concerns over abuse.

“We need to refine the system where corporal punishment is only meted out when there are serious misdemeanours. We certainly don’t want to go to the other extreme. We have to keep that balance.”

And while he agrees billions of rand will be required to ultimately restore education facilities in Zimbabwe, Coltart says it will not be difficult to raise the funds.

“Spending less on defence, downsizing the government and strong measures against corruption must be implemented to allow for increased flows into treasury.”

But, he adds: “ Sadly there is just not the political will right now, so we will continue to muddle along. Hopefully the elections will not be too disruptive. From this month we start working on wide-ranging legislation which will consolidate and rationalise 30 years of ad hoc legislation.

We want to produce a legislation bible for schools which will give them more autonomy, less central control and focus on children’s rights to cut down on abuse. Children learn in our schools and we don’t want to change that.”