The Ministry of Education is currently conducting a survey to ascertain which schools in the hinterland regions still use pit latrines with the aim of having them transition to flush toilets, Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand said yesterday.
According to sources, pit latrines can be found at schools in the Upper Mazaruni, the Pakaraimas and Chinese Landing.
Manickchand, in an interview with Stabroek News, noted that the education system has been decentralised and as such schools are managed by the regional governance system. The ministry has however asked for information about all schools that have pit latrines.
“The central ministry has asked for all schools that have pit latrines. What we are doing right now is finding out how many schools, if any at all, are using pit latrines and then we will have to look at conditions that exist and that are being required for them to transition to flush toilets.”
Efforts by Stabroek News to contact Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Sonia Parag for a comment were unsuccessful.
The issue was highlighted by Alliance For Change (AFC) leader, Nigel Hughes, when he told a gathering at Linden on August 17, that party members were shocked when they saw the pit latrines being used and even more appalled to learn that children of kindergarten age had to use them.
Hughes said that the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) had made recommendations to help eliminate this practice by volunteering grants for flushable toilets and running water and as such, questioned why the government had not taken up the offer. He further stated that residents have lamented that given the number of students using the facilities daily, the latrines fill up quickly and require moving “further and further away from the school.” Currently, he noted, residents were bemoaning the fact that they are running out of space and would have to go even further.
“The annual budgetary allocation to Phillipai [a village in the Upper Mazaruni, Region Seven] is $2 million for a community of about 2,000 persons. They are not children of a lesser God; they are equally entitled to an equitable share of the national patrimony. This is egregious!” he added.
The Education Minister then pointed out that money was approved to build a sanitary block for the school in June. She juxtaposed Hughes’ post with that of from Tamika Beharry, who stated that she is a District Coordinator at the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs. Beharry displayed a blueprint for a sanitary block she said had been planned for construction at the Phillipai Primary School.
Manickchand also explained to this newspaper that Phillipai has flush toilets but the children are unable to use them because they don’t have water.
“Phillipai has flush toilets but the kids don’t use them because they don’t have water.”
In 2008, nine-year-old Tenesha De Souza, a student of Santa Rosa Primary School at Moruca, had fallen into a pit latrine and died on her first day of school. The then PPP/C government had said that it would initiate plans to assess how many other schools were still using latrines.
