Pupils sitting for KCPE to enjoy free lunch, bottled water

Pupils sitting for this year’s Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) exams in Witeithie Ward, Juja Constituency will enjoy free lunch and bottled water.

Witeithie Member of County Assembly Macharia Taki at the weekend promised to provide free lunch and bottled drinking water to all KCPE candidates in his ward.

Taki said his office would make arrangements to have the food prepared and delivered to all the public schools during the exam period.

He said the move was aimed at helping children from humble background who are the majority in the local public schools and who cannot afford to pay the required lunch fee during the exams.

“Most pupils in the entire ward come from poor families and cannot therefore be able to raise the required money for lunch during the exam period and the food will go a long way in helping them,” said Mr Taki.

The ward rep said he decided to offer free lunch to the pupils after he was approached by a number of parents seeking monetary assistance to pay for the lunch fee for their children during the exam period.

KCPE is set to kick-off on October 30 and end on November 1. Reversals are slated to be held on October 29.

The MCA attributed the poor performance in some public schools to pupils’ absence due to high poverty levels.

“Some pupils and students who come from extremely poor families skip school to go and look for manual jobs so that they can get something to eat. This normally ends up affecting their perforce and that of their respective schools,” he said.

The ward has five public primary schools which has a total of 700 KCPE candidates this year.Each parent is being required to part with Sh 600 as lunch fees per pupil.

A section of elated parents who spoke to the Standard welcomed the move by the ward rep terming it as God sent.

“This will motivate the pupils whose parents could not be able to raise the required money for lunch during the exams. They will now be able to concentrate on their revision and eventually perform well in their examinations,” said Alice Wangui a parent at Nyacaba Primary School.

Wangui added the lunch donation to the pupils by the MCA was a relief to many parents who will now be able to attend to other domestic matters.

“Parents will now be able to channel their energies to other things touching on the welfare of their families without having to worry on where to get money for their children’s lunch during the exam,” she said.