Minister of Education, Douglas Siakalima has warned UPND sympathisers not to interfere with the running of the education system in the country.
Mr Siakalima said the education sector needs to be depoliticised and remove cadres who he claimed have infiltrated the sector for the last 10 years.
Mr Siakalima was speaking when he called on his Copperbelt Province counterpart, Elisha Matambo at Simon Mwansa Kapwepwe International Airport in Ndola yesterday.
The minister is on a nation wide tour of the education system with the aim of understanding the sector challenges.
“I want to take advantage of the presence of some of the party members here and emphasise that you should not interfere with the running of systems in the education sector. If you touch education, you destroy and kill the country,” Mr Siakalima said.
He said the education sector has suffered setbacks because those involved previously had abused their authority which affected many spheres of the sector.
“Of course some were abused, but there is a difference between abuse and being used. If you were being used you were willing to partner into bad vices and if you were being abused you were doing it with no option because the pollutants were too powerful and that is what was happening during the previous regime,” he said.
Mr Siakalima said President Hakainde Hichilema has placed premium to the education sector and that is why he wants to ensure that nothing interferes with the system.
He said the Head of State has given him a task to correct the foul happenings in the education sector, but that it will need concerted efforts from party stewards to ensure that the systems are corrected.
And Matambo assured support towards the depoliticising the education system in the province.
Mr Matambo said education an anchor to national development and thus it needs clear and established systems to run it. – ZANIS
