Children’s Parliament Ends Session

Albertina Nakale

16 May 2011

Windhoek — The 3rd Session of the Children’s Parliament concluded in Windhoek last Wednesday with the young parliamentarians issuing a wide-ranging communiqué at the end of the three-day session.

They adopted 19 motions, among them the importance of sign language education in schools and lack of sign language interpreters.

This motion was tabled by Kristofina Uahengo, a hearing-impaired child parliamentarian from the Khomas Region.

She said government is not very user-friendly when it comes to people who are hearing impaired and those with other handicaps.

She cited people with similar physical impediments having difficulty in accessing public facilities such as clinics, banks and hospitals among others, as there are no interpreters to assist them.

Uahengo therefore requested the Children’s Parliament to take the motion into consideration.

The member of parliament (MP) also felt there is need for vocational training centres countrywide especially in rural areas.

The MPs believe not everyone can afford to go to universities and technikons. Hence they said vocational centres would cater for students who are burdened financially and those willing to work with their hands.

Some MPs argued vocational schools are for slow learners, but others felt this was not the case.

The child MPs also agreed that children’s lives have become unsafe as young souls keep losing their lives in places they live.

Racism was also in the spotlight, with some MPs feeling it still exists in schools.

They said it is the teachers who are encouraging such attitudes among learners. They stressed schools should be the safest place for learners but in fact learners tend to hide away because they feel rejected when at school.

On information and communication technology (ICT), they adopted a motion stating ICT should be implemented in schools especially in rural areas as they believe ICT will be useful for instance when a teacher misses classes, and such teacher could still give classes through video conferencing.

Among the motions rejected was Namibia’s re-introduction of the British Cambridge curriculum as a medium of instruction in government schools.

This was rejected by a majority vote, with the MPs arguing the National Senior Secondary Certificate (NSSC) does not limit its students or learners from studying abroad.

They believe that Namibia took ownership of its own examination body, noting there is no proof that international universities will not accept a student because of the examination body being used, however this is based on how hard one commits him/herself to their schoolwork.

Unemployment among fresh graduates was also rejected as the education minister, Dr Abraham Iyambo, is already tackling the issue.

Another motion rejected was the one that calls for legalizing abortion as they argued that legalizing abortion would just encourage learners to fall pregnant and engage in sexual activities.

One of the motions adopted was one on the involvement of parents as partners in education as the child parliamentarians felt charity begins at home and that students can only focus on their studies if their parents pay attention to their work, especially in rural areas.

The other key motion adopted was the importance of agricultural science to be implemented as a compulsory subject in all schools as they felt agriculture is one of the few ways Namibia can sustain itself economically.

All in all the 3rd Session of the Children’s Parliament tabled 69 motions of which 19 motions were adopted, while the rest were either withdrawn or rejected or they were already catered for by the Minister of Education Dr Abraham Iyambo.

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