Where toilets shine more than classrooms

By Job Weru

Like 435 other pupils, Charles Wanjohi, 10, has mastered the art of survival. His school, Kabiruini Primary School in Mathira West District, has been reduced to a shell of what it used to be.

Classrooms at the 76-year-old school are dilapidated and some are without roofing, while those that are fitted with iron sheets resemble a fishing net, exposing pupils to open air learning.

The only decent structures left standing in the institution are a number of blocks of administration units and a couple of modern pit latrines that were put up last year, courtesy of businessman Mr Rigathi Gachagua, who is an old boy.

Imminent closure

But the toilets were not constructed under the normal school development scheme, since Mr Gachagua rushed to save the school from closure after the Public Health department condemned it.

School head teacher Mr Josephat Kahea says the school did not have money left for development and they appealed to Gachagua, an old boy, who donated Sh800,000 to help put up the structures.

“We were facing imminent closure and the only option left was to call on well wishers to help us,” says Mr Kahea.

A visit to the school gave two different sides of a coin. On entering the gate, one is faced with ramshackle structures some with spiked roofing, no windows and doors and potholed floor.

One of the classrooms used by Class Seven pupils has a wide hole in the black wall and teachers have to make use of a lesser space left in the black wall which is used as the blackboard.

Former self

The rear side of the school is lined up with pit latrines that are positioned just next to an old building which Winnie Mwangi, a parent, says wore out even before construction was completed.

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