By Bakah Derick in Bamenda
The Cameroon Teachers’ Trade Union CATTU has intensified calls for the rights of pupils and students to education in conflict zones in general and the South West and North West regions in particular to be respected.
The Teachers’ Trade union in partnership with the
Cameroon Education Network CEFAN reinforced the call they have been making for
the last three years since educational activities were interrupted in these
regions as part of activities to commemorate the 2019 Global Campaign for
Education in the North West Region.The Cameroon Teachers’ Trade Union CATTU has intensified calls for the rights of pupils and students to education in conflict zones in general and the South West and North West regions in particular to be respected.
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| Participants in session |
According to statistics at the regional
delegation of secondary for the North West, not more than 22 schools of the 520
existing in the region are functional. In a presentation on school shutdown
causes and effects by the Executive Secretary General for CATTU, since 21st
of November 2016 till date schools in the North West and South West region
Regions of Cameroon have lost their luster with a vast majority closed. The
Trade Unions noted that most of the schools have become home to armed groups
and military with many schools becoming dangerous places to venture into.
The SG blamed the situation on the armed
conflict between the “Military and Ambazonia separatist’s fighters”, ghost
towns, lock downs, displacements of teachers and students, lack of funds for
some confessional schools and so on. He concluded that the shutdown is man made.
He submitted to his colleagues that education remains indispensable even in
conflict resolutions as it heals the wounds of war and provides the right mind
frame for dialogue as a means to a solution.
On the effects of school shutdown the CATTU
SG noted the missing of school records, teaching-learning project compromised,
reduction of intellectual capacity of teachers, increase level of illiteracy,
employment and imprisonment, increase unskilled labour for industries, seizure
of influx of students into the region, lack of income for food sellers and
landlords due to a reduction of purchase and demand for houses for rents,
closure of financial institutions, reduction of the productive labour force, depreciation
of school buildings, furniture and equipment, high level of teenage pregnancy,
low self-esteem, depression, high prostitution rate, drug addiction and
substance abuse. With the absence of certificates as a result of school
shutdown, he regrets that many of our young people will not have access to
tertiary education and trade schools. While expressing the need for an end to a
school shutdown, he encouraged “all to embrace education and save our society
from total collapse or reject it close our schools and live in degeneracy.”
Other presentations at the reflection focused on Fundamental rights to education, and the girl child in conflict situation: case of crisis in NW/SW.
The Global Action Week for Education GAWE it
should be said is “an international annual campaign let by the Global Campaign
for Education with support from UNESCO to raise awareness of the importance of
education for achieving sustainability and the commitments made by all to reach
the global education goal by 2030.” This year activities are centered on the
theme “making the right to an inclusive equitable quality education a reality”
with the slogan “My education my rights.”
Mindful of the socio-political context, the
Trade Union and partners hope that the educational forum will be convened this
2019 and that a remediation strategy to raise standards and make up for lost
time will be established which will provide for a successful reopening of
schools especially in rural areas where several attempts to open school doors
have failed.