Students forced out of dormitories days before exams

EASTERN PROVINCE BUGESERA—Examination fear and anxiety for 84 Senior-3 candidates at Kanzenze secondary school has increased as security, not school officials forced to leave dorm rooms after failure to pay for hostel fees. The students were allegedly sent home over failure to pay their hostel upkeep for the remaining days to the exams. Without elaborating details, a caretaker of the students at the hostel, Butera, said the students were told to report back to sit their exams. Kanzenze is a government ordinary level secondary school and the school is supposed to incur all the students cost including hostel fees. Students speaking to the press said the school administration had “arrogantly refused to foot their bills.” They complained that the decision to send them home at this hour would affect their academic performance in the national exams on October 31. They blamed hostel authorities, saying they were “after making money.” The hostel is owned by François Survey Nyagahinga, and accommodates students from different schools around Nyamata. Headmaster Gaspard Nkurunziza acknowledged the problem but downplayed the effect on student performance saying, “success in national exams would not be determined within the three or four days the students would be away.” Each student pays Frw20,000 as hostel fees each semester. Nkurunziza explained that previously the school maintained students during the first and second term holidays at the hostel but they turned out to indulge in other activities around town other than academics. The hostel lists all costs including food, firewood, electricity, water, and security for the total number of students even when others would not turn up. “We are not after destabilizing students or against their success but the school was not ready to incur costs towards a service that would be abused by the beneficiaries,” read a statement. Ends