Matopo High power outage enters day 11

By Kudzai Chikiwa

Matopo High School in Matabeleland South province has gone for 11 days without electricity at a time when pupils are sitting public examinations.

The headmaster of the Brethren in Christ Church-run boarding school, Mr Gardson Sibanda, said after every two weeks, the school goes for five days without electricity.

“This time the school has been without power for 11 days at a time when pupils are writing exams,” he said.
Public examinations started on October 26 and are ending on November 27.

Mr Sibanda said the school was now relying on a generator which could only operate for a few hours.

“Our generator breaks down from time to time due to overuse and it consumes up to 180 litres of diesel per day which is very expensive,” he said.

Mr Sibanda said each time there is no electricity they contact Zesa but the response has not been good hence the school was spending days without power.

He said the non-availability of power was likely to affect the performance of his pupils in public exams as they could not prepare for the exams at night.

“Our pupils are at risk of failing because they have limited time to prepare for the exams due to non-availability of electricity. Normally pupils wake up at night to prepare for the following day’s exam,” he said.

Mr Sibanda said the non-availability of electricity was also affecting pupils on special medication like diabetes as their drugs need refrigeration.

“Diabetic pupils need to take insulin which must be refrigerated,” said Mr Sibanda.

He said cooking meals for pupils was also a big challenge when there is no electricity and the school also needs power to pump water.

Zesa spokesperson, Mr Fullard Gwasira, said since there was no load shedding these days, the problem at Matopo High School was probably due to a fault. The Chronicle.