Funding needed urgently as schools resume

As children go back to school after a year of disrupted classes, Cote d'Ivoire is calling on donors to help rebuild the war-ravaged school system. On Monday, tens of thousands of primary and secondary school children returned to their classrooms in government-held areas. Meanwhile, Education Minister Michel Amani N'Guessan was briefing international donors on the need to put Cote d'Ivoire's school system back on track. N'Guessan said the government needed to hire 4,000 new teachers, pointing out that this number had been lost from schools around the country. N'Guessan blamed the teacher deficit on war casualties, the effects of HIV-Aids and the loss of teaching staff who had quit the profession. The minister had a conciliatory message for the estimated 6,000 tecahers who had stayed on in rebel-held territory since the conflict began in September 2002. "No legal charges, much less sanctions will be carried against you", he emphasised, while urging the teachers to declare themselves to the ministry so that they could receive salaries. The government plans to reopen schools in rebel-held areas in January 2004. But N'Guessan stressed more funding would be needed to get schools functioning properly in towns such as Korhogo, Bouake, Odienne and Man. The donors present, including the World Bank, The United Nations, the European Union, and the French and Japanese cooperation agencies, made no firm financial promises, but pledged their support. The World Bank's representative, Mamadou Dia, said a disbursement of US $56 million for education had been withheld pending a full independent auditing of Cote d'Ivoire's educational needs. "Cote d'Ivoire pledges to pay back donors if a new audit shows different figures", N'guessan told his audience. N'Guessan, one of President Laurent Gbagbo's ministers who has kept his post since first nominated in 2000, also highlighted the CFA 14 billion (around $20 million) internal debt that the government owes privately-run schools, and the 600 million FCFA (around $1 million) that it owes publishing companies as part of a governmnent plan that provides "free" books to primary and secondary schools. The reopening of schools coincides with a new lifting of restrictions on school uniforms. For over 41 years, Ivorian primary and secondary school pupils, girls and boys, were mandated to wear uniforms, a measure which also applied to private schools. In 2001, the Gbagbo government abolished compulsory school uniform for primary school students. Now the government has gone further. "Starting on 6 Ocotber and throughout the entire national territory, the wearing of uniforms [in secondary schools] is left up to the free choice of the parents and their capabilities", N'Guessan announced in a radio broadcast on Sunday, one day before classes started. N'Guessan characterised the move as a poverty-reduction measure, but told parents they remained the moral guardians of their children. "The ban on uniforms is not synonymous with debauchery", N'guessan said,reminding students that clothes sporting political and commercial slogans would not be allowed.