A tourism school, Ecole Secondaire de Hotelerie et Tourisme de Gasogi, closed in November last year for lack of facilities, will remain closed this coming term, The New Times has learnt.Talking to The New Times, last week, the State Minister in charge of Primary and Secondary Education, Dr Mathias Harebamungu, said the school will not reopen until it respects all the necessary requirements.According to the minister, the secondary school based in Gasabo District lacks adequate infrastructure, including a staff room and text books. “The Ministry together with Gasabo District closed the school because it does not meet required standards. We are determined to keep it closed until they put in place all that was requested,” Harebamungu said.The minister said that earlier this month, he inspected the school and found it had only six text books, and none of them was in English. The school is also understaffed, with only 9 teachers.Harebamungu said the school has been marred by malpractices like students’ strikes since 2009, due to failure to pay teachers which often prompted it to withhold students’ report cards.Among the other reasons for its closure was poor sanitation.Subsequent to the closure, about 500 students sponsored by the Fund for Genocide survivors (FARG) were transferred to other schools, a fact that the proprietor says cost him a significant amount of money that he would have used in fulfilling the requirements.John Yaramba Karagire, who is also the school’s legal representative, further accuses local authorities of blocking his efforts to secure a loan to use in meeting the requirements.He claimed that he was due to receive a bank loan of about Rwf220 million but Gasabo District blocked it.“I appeal to the Ministry and Gasabo District to give us ample time to put in place what they are requesting us because it requires a lot of money yet at the moment we lack funds,” Yaramba said. Willy Ndizeye, the Mayor of Gasabo District, said Karagire’s accusations were baseless.
