Education Cabinet Secretary, Amina Mohammed, alerted the parents who will fail to take their children to school to be on the look out. She meant her words as police in Athi River, Machakos County, have arrested over ten people for failing to take their children to school.
The parents were arrested at Kinanie area following a tip off by the area chief Timothy Musinga who led the police to their homes. In an operation that lasted the entire day, police managed to rescue more than 15 children aged between three and 15 years.
The parents and their children were held briefly at the Athi River Police Station before being arraigned at the Mavoko Law Court. Chief Musinga said the operation to arrest all the parents who fail to give basic education to their children is a directive from the government and will continue; ”This is a directive from the government that we arrest all the parents who neglect their children by denying them basic education, we will not relent on this.”
Some of the children are said to have been found collecting scrap metal for sale; ”Many of these children, mostly boys, are now doing scrap metal business, when we ask them why they are doing it they say that it’s their parents who send them to look for money.”
This incident comes a few days after the residents of Athi River pleaded with the government to construct more public schools to enable them take their children to school. Lack of enough schools has hit the areas like Mlolongo town and its environs squarely owing to few public primary schools prompting most children to stay at home. The populous Mlolongo town has two public schools namely Ngwata and Mlolongo Primary School.
Mlolongo primary has a population of 1,325 pupils. However, currently pupils are studying in temporary structures after the main classes begun collapsing last year. More pupils are now spilling over to Ngwata primary school built three years ago under CDF kitty. The school also hosts more than 1,100 pupils far beyond its capacity.
Mavoko MP Patrick Makau say education crisis is alarming at Mlolongo saying more land is needed for schools to be constructed through CDF kitty; ”We are aware with the worrying situation in this area, however we need land to construct schools and it’s not there.”