WUC disconnects Ramotswa deaf school
Staff Writer | Thursday June 5, 2014 10:21
Mmegi has learnt that the WUC cut off water supply on May 22, 2014, due to three-year arrears accumulating to P608,000.
Although the water supply was cut off during vacation, school officially started on Tuesday, meaning that the more than 100 deaf students enrolled at the Centre have to do without critical supplies.
The majority, if not all the deaf students enrolled at the school live in hostels within the institution, and arrived to officially start their second term on June 01.
Further information suggests that since the schools opened, the students have stayed away from school, as they do not have water for drinking, bathing, and for use in the school toilets.
The Executive Director of the Botswana Society for the Deaf (BS), Orapeleng Mokgosi, confirmed yesterday that the institution has not had water in almost two weeks, assuring that they are working on plans to settle the bill.
“We plan to pay the bill and we are still liaising with various organisations to help us. But I cannot definitely say at this moment when the bill will be paid,” she said.
She said that the institution has been begging for water from a nearby primary school to cook for the students. The BSD runs centres for Deaf Education in Ramotswa and Francistown.
Mokgosi said that they are in this situation after the South East District Council unceremoniously stopped its patronage in 2011.
“The Council had been paying our water bill. We don’t know why they stopped and that is one of the things we are trying to find out. The explanation we have received is that the people currently in charge of the Council are unaware of the previous arrangement,” she said.
The cutting off of water supply comes barely a fortnight after the Industrial Court brokered a peace deal between BSD and its employees who had downed tools in protest of unpaid salaries.
The latest troubles also follow an audit into the institution’s books by the ministries of Education and Skills Development and Health, the findings of which allege gross maladministration at the school.
In a letter to the BSD, the Education Ministry’s Director of Special Support Services had demanded a response to the allegations, on the strength of which the ministry would approve or disapprove funds to the BSD.
The two BSD-run institutions are almost exclusively funded through a subvention from the Department of Special Support Services, which takes care of operational expenses and salaries.
Education spokesperson, Silas Sehularo told Mmegi that while the ministry has received the BSD’s response, it is still studying it and consulting on the way forward.
“In the meantime, the ministry has allocated funds to BSD, to allow the school to function,” Sehularo said.
Mmegi sources say the funds given to the BSD have been slashed from P600,000 annually to just P300,000.
However, Sehularo was reluctant to name the exact figures his ministry extends to the BSD, preferring to say instead that the allocation of funds is dependent on various factors.
“These include, but are not limited to the following: the needs of each centre in a given year, overall provision in the ministry budget for NGO subvention for each financial year and expenditure trends by each beneficiary,” he said.
Meanwhile, by late last night scores of parents were reported taking their children home after the institution failed to connect water as promised.