KARONGI- The project to fully  complete 78 classrooms and 156 latrines to facilitate the 12-year basic education program in Karongi district commenced yesterday.

In the company of local leaders from various parts of the district, thousands of residents participated in communal work (umuganda) to prepare the foundation  for classrooms in Rubengera sector.

At the start of the exercise, District Mayor Bernard Kayumba called for residents’ participation.

"We should all be proud to participate in this program because in the future it will benefit our own children,” Kayumba told a cheering crowd.

He expressed optimism that the two -storeyed classroom block will have been finished by the start of next academic year in January.

Kayumba dismissed rumours that engineers and other skilled labourers who are hired for special expertise during construction are never paid.

"Yes there have been some problems in the past but they have now been solved and the workers get their wages,” he said.

25-year old Jean de Dieu Irenzeho,a local resident of the district,  is optimistic that all the aims and targets can be achieved if individual efforts are put together.

"With this commitment, it shows that if we all work together, we can achieve every goal. One gets a feeling of satisfaction by participating in such developmental programs,” said Irenzeho.

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