World Bank splurges US$$129m on Rwanda education
...As Zim teachers’ recruitment kicks into overdrive
TICHAONA KATSVAMUTIMA IN CHINHOYI AND EDWIN ASHIMWE IN KIGALI
The World Bank (WB) will avail about US$129m to support Rwanda’s efforts to improve teachers’ competence as the East African nation is recruiting local teachers.
Rwanda will access funds from the WB it secured under the Quality Basic Education for Human Capital Development project.
The fund consisted of US$50m credit, a US$50m grant in addition to a co-financing of US$29.062m grant from the Global Partnership for Education.
Speaking in Rwanda, the WB country manager, Rolande Pryce, said: “This additional financing is a continuation of the World Bank’s support for the Government of Rwanda’s Vision 2050 agenda. It aims to play a critical role in reversing the learning losses incurred during the Covid-19 pandemic.”
For the past three years, the initiative has registered achievements in access to schools, along with improved teaching and learning conditions in Rwanda.
The development comes at a time when Rwanda has begun recruiting teachers from Zimbabwe to fill skills gap in the east African country.
The recruitment of teachers from Zimbabwe by the President Paul Kagame administration is coming at a time when the educators are at loggerheads with the government over poor salaries and deteriorating working conditions.
The teachers are exerting pressure on the government to pay them in United State dollars. They have been pushing to get salaries matching the pre-October 2018 level of US$540 a month.
Teachers are earning an average of ZWL$30 000, plus US$175 a month and have since declared incapacitation.
Kagame has seen gold out of Zimbabwe teachers, who are more than willing to take up the job offers in Rwanda under the government-to-government arrangement.
The recruitment of Zimbabwe teachers, who are vying to ply their trade in Rwanda kicked off early this week at Harare Institute of Technology in the capital Harare where examinations are being conducted.
The examinations are also being conducted at Hillside Teachers College in Bulawayo, Masvingo Polytechnic, Gweru Polytechnic and Chinhoyi University of Technology.
The interviews are expected to end today.
The permanent secretary in Rwanda’s Ministry of Education, Charles Karakye and eight other officials from Rwanda and the Rwandan Embassy to Zimbabwe, are supervising and conducting interviews across Zimbabwe together with the team from Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare.
Speaking to Business Times at Chinhoyi University of Technology, Karakye yesterday said : “We are recruiting competent education personnel to be employed in Rwanda in job positions under four categories: basic education, basic TVET (technical and vocational education and training), polytechnic and universities.”
A recruitment manual was jointly agreed to facilitate the hiring.
Karakye said those successful will start working in Rwanda next month or early October
The Ministry of Public, Labour and Social Welfare spokesperson, Respect Chofamba, said Zimbabwe is “making strides in giving people opportunity to work outside the country as most people were being duped by bogus recruitment agencies”.
Business Times understands that more than 400 teachers have taken part in the virtual interviews this week.
The recruitment of teachers is being conducted after Zimbabwe and Rwanda last year signed a Memorandum of Understanding to pave the way for the recruitment of teachers from the southern African country.
Additional information from Rwanda’s www.newtimes.co.rw
