School girls DROP OUT OF KENYAN SCHOOL after getting impregnated by their teachers

Homabay County: – A row is simmering between parents and teachers of the Owich primary school in Lambwe division, Mbita district, in Kenya’s Homa Bay county, over escalating cases of schoolgirls dropping out of the school after allegedly getting impregnated by some amorous teachers.

The situation is so bad that parents have petitioned the government to intervene and deal with the teachers who are cutting the education of their daughters short.

The Homa Bay county is located in Nyanza province, some 396 kilometers from Nairobi- Kenya’s capital city.

The school’s headmaster Polycap Odero has been accused of regarding the issue apathetically, and refusing to act against his errant staff who have been mentioned by the victims as having impregnated the girls.

Reports say that last year alone, 4 pupils dropped out of the school after they were allegedly impregnated by some teachers who are still teaching in the day school that has nearly 260 pupils.

Parents who talked to the press stated that 11 pupils dropped out of school in 2008 after they were allegedly impregnated by some teachers who have been old boys of the institution, after completing their college education and returning to teach at the same school.

Parents asserted that in testimony of the sorry state of affairs in the Owich primary school, a teacher in the school unashamedly proceeded in marrying one of the pupils whom he allegedly impregnated sometimes back, while the rest dropped out

As the moral rot allegedly took center stage in the school, parents pleas to have the teachers transferred and replaced with upright ones fell on deaf ears.

Reports also emerged that pupils were forced to till and harvest crops from pieces of land owned by the teachers within the school precincts, and often missed out from school lessons.

The headmaster was accused of being unconcerned over the issue on grounds that this off-school exercise by the pupils in the teachers land was a private arrangement between the teachers and the parents.

But the parents deny such an arrangement exists, insisting that it was the teachers who were forcing the pupils to work on their pieces of land.

The girls were also asked to fetch firewood by the teachers in their homes.

It was widely believed that this was the time when the weird teachers lured the school girls to their homes and impregnated them.

A pupil is said to have lost her life at some stage of being forced to work for the teachers and was allegedly run over by a tractor.

Reports said that the girls were also asked to draw water from the Lake Victoria, located five kilometers away from the school by the teachers, which exposed them to the danger of being gored by crocodiles which had infested the world famous lake, the reservoir of the Nile river and the largest Lake in Africa.

Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes named after Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom by John Hanning Speke, the first European to discover the Lake.

Parents have for the umpteenth time protested against the action of the teachers sending the school girls to draw water from the Lake, but their complaints have gone unheeded, as the headmaster seems to be siding with the teachers and sees nothing amiss with the action.

And besides, the pupils are also exposed to the imminent danger of getting devoured by wild animals since their school is located close to the Ruma National park and Ruri hills which house the fierce animals.

Should calamity strike hell would break lose, owing to the fact that the nearest health center is 15 kilometers away! (The Zambezian)