Cabinet is set to discuss conditions that the Ministry of Health and the Covid-19 taskforce have given for reopening schools. The cabinet is expected to sit together with the Ministry of education today Monday, June 15 at the statehouse to discuss the matter.
“We want schools to ensure that the environment for our children is safe, secure and healthy. We want to ensure that our children are not sick and if any of them falls sick, the institution will take maximum care of the child,” Mr Muyingo said on Friday, June 13 while receiving a donation of 4,000 litres of mosquito-repelling paint.
Muyingo was, however, hesitant to discuss at length the conditions that schools have been given citing that it was too early to divulge them since cabinet had not yet discussed them.
Muyingo said that schools are required to renovate buildings, build new ones to decongest, provide facemasks for all students, adding that they are considering having all teachers and students checked for the virus before allowing them at school.
Speaking about the continuation of candidates and final year students as earlier proposed, Muyingo said it was not possible, especially for primary and secondary schools because many of them do not have accommodation facilities where students would be easily kept.
“We are now looking at a phased approach. We are considering beginning with about 100 tertiary institutions and 50 universities because those have boarding facilities,” Muyingo said.
“The Ministry of Education is planning for everybody. We do not want anyone to be left behind. When a student completes P.7, what happens to S.1? That is why we are planning for a phased reopening,” the minister added.
Following the outbreak of Covid-19 in the world, the government of Uganda halted all education activities on March 18 in a bid to prevent the spread of the deadly disease.
As the country started to inch back to normalcy, the dilemma facing the government would now be how and when to reopen schools.
The government has issued several contradictory statements in re-opening of schools in the previous days. Dates were announced for reopening schools but later retracted. Both the government and the school-going children face a dilemma.
