Sleeping in school - as long as the floods last

SCHOOLS continue to close down as heavy rains together with floods from Angola hit the North with full force over the Weekend.

In the Ohangwena Circuit, the Onghala Primary School has closed down due to floods while another school, the Shingunguma Primary School at Engava, also in the Ohangwena Circuit has about 40 children accommodated in the schools extra two classrooms as it has become too dangerous to cross the flooded Oshana’s. At Omufitu Wanakashole Police Station, children from the Haikonda Primary School have set up camps there to be closer to the school due to floods as well. Many of the schools had initially planned to set up tents on the school premises with the assistance of the Regional Governor but due to a lack of tents at the Governor’s offices, that has not been possible.

“This situation has gotten worse. Before, we used to be able to cross the water, but now even I can’t walk through there as the water goes up to the shoulders - imagine now the children. The whole school is surrounded by water and we have come up with the solution to accommodate the children here because it is very risky for them to cross the Oshana,” said School Principal Ndilimeke Halweendo’s. Halweendo’s said it is not the first time that the school is hit by floods as they have had to close down over the past two years due to floods.

The children will be staying over at the school until April when the school closes. “We normally just close down the school during the floods and that has been the case over the past two years. But we have decided to allow the children to just sleep at the school. We are lucky we had renovations and upgrades at the school recently, so we have two classrooms that are not being used for lessons at the moment, that is where we are accommodating the learners and some of the teachers too because we loose too much time when the lessons are interrupted,” said Halweendo.

She said most of the children who go to other schools in the area but live far away have also moved to be accommodated at nearby home-steads to be closer to the schools. The schools are appealing for Government assistance with the provision of food and mosquito nets. “There are mosquitoes here; we would like help of food and mosquito nets for malaria prevention.

Most of the parents have been helping us since we moved in over the weekend, they brought in food but it is not enough, the children are too many, so we are really appealing to Government for help,” said Halweendo.

click to enlarge SCHOOL FLOODS: It has become dangerous for many children to cross flooded oshana’s to go to school