The headline: “Children stay out of school because of lack of toilet facility” caught my attention as I was scanning through the internet for news stories and feature articles to read. That was when I stumbled upon that headline which appeared on the June 6 2011 edition of myjoyonline news.
According to the story, pupils in a community near Winneba in the central region are staying out of school because their school does not have a place of convenience.
The story stated that out of over a population of 2,000 people in a community called Sankor, only about 5 per cent of households have toilet facilities. The rest of the population have to share a single public place of convenience which has six seats. Three of the seats are for the female population while the other three are for the male population.
As for the children, like in many communities, they always come as an after-thought. And so, according to the story, the school children are forced to travel long distances to attend nature’s call at the sea shore.
The story further indicated that the journey from school to the sea shore is quite a distance. By the time they complete the round trip, they are too late for school.
This is a worrying development. Why would a community, in this day and age, close its eyes to some such pressing needs of its people for this long? Does a place of convenience not seem a priority to them? Have we lost the community good that used to be a regular feature on the development calendar of rural communities whereby certain days were set aside to do communal work? When we talk about the cities being filthy with plenty of disorder, we are always comparing them to the beauty and neatness in our villages. So what must be going on in this little community?
The anguish that the children of Sankor have to contend with on a daily basis is anybody’s guess. The thought of queuing up with adults to take turns at the only place of convenience is sickening. In this world of adults first, who is going to give the poor child a chance irrespective of the fact that he or she has to get to school on time.
Perhaps, if their school had toilets, the struggle of the children would not be too overbearing. But no, school does not have toilets and so, the children have to endure long distance walks to the sea shore just to attend to nature’s call.
As I imagined a typical day for these children, many unfortunate reminders came to mind and I wondered if the community elders and the Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) at Sankor have these thoughts at heart too.
I have been wondering what the chances of a child who is born and bred in such a community in this twenty first century Ghana are. Would they ever see themselves coming out as Junior High School or Senior High School graduates? Are there any chances of them getting into any tertiary institution at a time when common basic school education could possibly be eluding them due to lateness and perhaps absenteeism because they have to travel a long distance to attend to toilet first.
But quite apart from losing their chances of a better future, what about the health implications the unfortunate daily practice is bound to bring to the community? Do the children know that they have to wash their hands with soap and water after they defecate and if they do, who is ensuring that at the sea shore. How about the gradual destruction of their sea front and the pollution of the same sea that the fathers and uncles are fishing from?
Boy, where is the sense of duty of communities these days? How on earth would a society expose its growing children to such uncouth practices and make them believe that their alternative to a place of convenience is the beach? How responsible can we be as adults and what habits are we supervising them to cultivate. This is a serious indictment on the community and all of us as a nation. One wonders how many more communities like Sankor are facing such predicament.
As we have come to know it, many rural communities use their annual festivals and other festive occasions such as Easter and Christmas to organise fund raising events for projects in the community. What is Sankor doing in this regard?
Are there no prominent citizens of the village who can help construct more places of convenience, at least for the school? Is there no development committee in Sankor overseeing development initiatives? What are the elders in the town doing about the situation or are they looking up to the district assembly, or their Member of Parliament for their share of the common fund? Is there a PTA for the school? These are some of the questions that I tried to find answers to, as I thought through the plight of the children and the community at large.
Maybe however, those prominent local individuals and the local town committees cannot be bothered. They are looking up to the central government for their “share” of the national cake. Would you blame them? Maybe not, for if we have politicians promising the people all the colourful things under the sun during the “vote for me” period; of course they would fold their arms and wait for manner to drop from heaven. Though they may have a point it is at the same time a dangerous attitude to adopt for heaven they say helps those who help themselves.
What alternatives are there for the school children to get decent toilets at their school? At times like these, one sometimes wishes that our local government system was any better and that chief executives were more accountable to the people. It makes me wonder whether we would not have been better off in such situations if we adopted the system whereby local government officials go through competitive general elections rather than the President appointing them. Such community problems are better dealt with at the local authority level.
The on-line story did not indicate if the Sankor school is a “school under tree”. If it is, then, perhaps while the better Ghana agenda is in top gear and “schools under trees” are being given face-lifts in readiness for 2012, I believe this is going to be the luck of the Sankor community school. Their predicament has come into the public domain at the right time, I guess.
If for nothing at all, maybe the District Assembly and the MP for the area can begin construction of places of convenience for the school in particular and work towards a commissioning date so that on his next rounds, the President would do them the honours. The school children of the Sankor community are losing out.
In the meantime, they could do with some help from anyone who is touched by their predicament. Development agencies and NGOs who can help construct places of convenience for the school children at Sankor would have brought relief to the children today and would have taught them valuable lessons about cleanliness and hygiene, the preservation of the environment and life skills for generations now and years to come. At that point, they would make news for the right reasons.
Author: Vicky Wireko/vickywirekoandoh@yahoo.com
Continued here:
Feature: Reality Zone – Schools without toilets? Making news for the wrong reason