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Volume 11, Issue 6 
REGIONAL NEWS
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REGIONAL NEWS
The government has drawn up three literacy programs that give priority to women and children.
Dubbed “One Literate Woman, Three Children Educated,” the first part of the five-year program is expected to help 25,000 women learn to read and write. It will also send 75,000 children to school in the most disadvantaged regions of the country, between 1998 and 2001.
Some 10,000 children, mostly girls in the informal agricultural sector in rural areas, are also expected to benefit under the second phase of the program, scheduled to begin in 1999, according to Education Minister Pierre Kipre.
Kipre also indicated the third phase of the program would help educate at least 10,000 women every year in the country, mostly in the rural areas. The literacy rate in Cote d’Ivoire, which has a population of 15.8 million, is currently estimated at 43 percent.
The minister said the government’s ambition is to increase the literacy rate to 84 percent by the year 2000. He added that 70 percent of women, who constitute more than 51 percent of the population, would be able to read and write by then.
The new program comes at a time when Cote d’Ivoire’s education system, which used to be one of the best in the West African subregion in the 1970s, is still feeling the effects of economic reforms adopted in 1990.
During the 1970s, annual economic growth rates of 7 to 12 percent enabled the government to heavily subsidize education. The government even experimented with televised lessons — one of the few African nations to do so.
An economic downturn in the 1980s, however, led to adjustment measures in all social sectors, including education. Although public primary schools do not charge fees, parents now pay for educational materials.
The schools have also failed to keep up with the annual 3 percent population growth rate, leaving many children without places in local schools.
According to UNESCO, the school-age population increased from 1.3 million to 2.08 million between 1980 and 1992. But the percentage of children enrolled in schools shrank from 79 percent to 69 percent.
- Panafrican News Agency
Malawi commemorated its National Education Day in July amid complaints about deteriorating education standards in primary and secondary schools.
Parents who attended the official ceremonies presented politicians and officials with grievances about rapidly deteriorating education standards over the past few years.
Parents blamed the decline on the government’s lack of commitment and seriousness.
President Bakili Muluzi, an advocate of free primary school education, has always said education is one of the most important assets in the development of the nation.
Of late, however, the Malawi education system has been rocked by countless problems.
Poor examination results have been attributed to a lack of school materials and a shortage of teachers.
Government corruption as well as corruption within the Malawi National Examinations Board (MANEB) and among teachers have also been blamed.
The MANEB disqualified about 6,000 pupils who took the 1997 Malawi School Certificate of Education (MSCE) examinations for cheating.
More than three quarters of the 28,328 school-sponsored candidates failed the MSCE examinations last year.
Peter Mitunda, chair of the southern branch of the Association for the Teaching of English in Malawi, noted that very few students who complete secondary school are able to express themselves in proper English.
He lamented a lack of incentives and support for teachers as a major factor contributing to deteriorating standards.
“English teachers cannot help improve the situation if they are not given enough incentives and support, and if they do not have reliable teaching materials,” Mitunda said.
The government, however, blames the proliferation of private schools as contributing to the lowering of educational standards.
Brown Mpinganjira, minister of education and sports, warned that his ministry would be strict in issuing licences for new private schools when the next school session begins in January 1999.
- All Africa News Agency (Nairobi)
Mozambique hopes to make between 800,000 and 1 million adults literate in local languages and Portuguese by the year 2000, according to the Ministry of Education.
The literacy push is part of a bilingual education project that began in 1990.
A study from the ministry’s National Directorate of Basic Education states that the Institute for Educational Development has produced and tested materials to be used for community education in four Mozambican languages: Tsonga, Emakua, Sena and Ndau.
The program also envisages intensive training of 25,000 nonprofessional monitors and instructors.
Other components of the program include literacy and training for 11- to 14-year-old children who have no access to normal schooling, as well as the creation of libraries, rural newspapers and cultural centers.
When Mozambique became independent in 1975, the country had an illiteracy rate of 93 percent, an inadequate school network, very few teachers and no experience in adult education.
The first mass literacy campaign was launched in July 1978 and resulted in the reduction of the illiteracy rate among Mozambicans above 15 years of age to 72.8 percent within two years.
In 1981, there were 450,000 adults in literacy classes.
Education, however, was a priority target for the apartheid-backed Renamo rebels during the war of destabilization. By 1989 the number of people attending literacy classes had collapsed to 46,225.
The assault on education was uppermost in rural primary schools. Between 1983 and 1991, Renamo rebels destroyed 3,110 primary schools and 58 percent of the entire school network, which affected 1.2 million pupils and 19,700 teachers.
- Panafrican News Agency
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