John Muyamba
Tuguva-Former president Hifikepunye Pohamba and his family on Tuesday handed over a classroom block with three classrooms and a storeroom at Tuguva Combined School in Tuguva village in the Kavango West Region where the former president settled after his retirement.
The block was constructed last year at a cost of slightly over N$ 1 million.
“Today is a special day as we are witnessing the handover of this classroom block. The community of Tuguva, and the region as a whole appreciates the response from former president Hifikepunye Pohamba and family for responding to the request of the school,” Kavango West Regional Governor Sirkka Ausiku said.
“As a region it is a privilege to receive this permanent structure that will benefit our children. This block will address overcrowding of classrooms at this school,” Ausiku added.
Tuguva Combined School, which has 347 learners, now has 11 classrooms whereas before the donation it only had eight classrooms that some grades shared through multi-grade teaching where two grades were taught in one class.
“This is a relief as we are now going to separate these classes. Multi-grade teaching is going to stop now, because before we didn’t have space so we had to combine some junior primary classes,” the school’s headmaster Fredricks Ngoma Ihemba said.
“The year 2018 has just started and I’m therefore pleased that Tuguva combined school is starting the year on a positive note with this official handover of the new classrooms to the school and indeed to the Ministry of Education,” the former president said at the handover.
“This is a demonstration of growth and progress at the school and indeed for the community. Education is the key to everything, if you have a community that does not have good children going to school; if you have a society that does not have educated people then you cannot talk about developmental progress because progress can only be brought about by those who are educated,” Pohamba noted.
Pohamba added that the Swapo-led government, founding president Sam Nujoma, he and the incumbent leader Hage Geingob wanted to see every child educated, and they all wanted to see the future of this country in good hands.
Pohamba urged the school’s administration to see to it that teachers were doing their job efficiently to yield good results at the end of the day.
“We want to see future leaders of Namibia, in different fields; in education, health services and engineering and even a president to come from Tuguva, why not? If children are taught you can get a president from children who went to school at Tuguva,” Pohamba encouraged learners.
According to the former president, the handover of the classrooms must be viewed against the reality that the lack of classrooms had been and remained a serious challenge in many parts of the country.
But government on the other hand had done a great deal to build schools ever since independence, and not only building schools but also establishing institutions of higher learning.