A civic education course for students who completed secondary and vocational training education that was expected to start today has been postponed.

Speaking to The New Times, Ladislas Ngendahimana, the communication expert at the Ministry of Local Government, said the postponement was due to insufficient mosquito nets at the sites where the students would spend about 10 days.

"We found that mosquito nets at the sites do not match with the number of students expected. We had requested students to bring own mosquito nets but there are some who told us that they didn’t have. That’s why we decided to postpone it,” Ngendahimana said.

He said efforts to get rooms sprayed with insecticide were also not possible.

"We asked the Ministry of Health to see if they could spray insecticides in the rooms that would host the students but they told us that they were not able to spray all the rooms in one day. However, they are going to start as soon as possible. I believe that within the next week the process will have been completed. Then after, we will communicate the day to start the civic education,” he said.

After a stakeholders meeting last evening, authorities said the civic education will take place on January 11.

Some 42,687 students who completed general secondary education and 23,129 others who completed Technical and Vocational Education and Training in 2015 are expected to attend the civic education.

editorial@newtimes.co.rw