NURC launches civic education syllabus

GASABO - The National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC), last Friday, at La Palisse Hotel launched a civic education syllabus book for solidarity camps locally known as ingando. The syllabus book contains tips on human relationships, Rwanda’s history, the nation and citizenship, human rights, good governance, economy and social affairs among others. At the official launch, NURC Executive Secretary, Fatuma Ndangiza said that the solidarity camps have been running without an official syllabus but that a lot of the contents in the syllabus were already in motion. “Today, we are proud to show up and launch this syllabus which we have been working on since 2005,” Fatuma said. “We are happy for the NURC effort to come up with an official syllabus. The local government is also a beneficiary,” Charles Muhinda who represented the Local Government said. He also cited Umuganda(communal work) and Gacaca(indigenous form of restorative justice) courts as some of the areas where it has been applied so far. Innocent Mutimura, the Chairman of the Students’ Club for Unity and Reconciliation (SCUR), said that the syllabus will help them to reach out to university students to combat Genocide ideology in schools. He also added that SCUR was started in 1998 after the first solidarity camp, with the purpose of training all university and secondary students to fight the Genocide dogma. “We have consulted the experts about the content and they confirmed it as relevant,” Sarah Bawaya, a NURC staff member, explained. The function was attended by representatives of all ministries, public and private universities and the consultants who designed the syllabus under NURC supervision. Ends