Kisumu West MP Hon. Rosa Buyu in a previous event// Photo Courtesy.
Kotetni Primary School board of management (BOM) are desperately appealing to Kisumu West Member of Parliament, Hon. Rosa Buyu and her National Government-CDF committee to move with speed and allocate some emergency funds from the kitty to facilitate the construction of adequate pit latrines to save the learning institution from being closed by the public health department.
Speaking to The Nyanza Review at the school during the World Toilet Day celebration, the headteacher, Mr James Kowiyo expressed concerns saying that the pit latrines in the school are all full, hence the need to construct new ones before the schools are opened in January next year.
The school has a pupil population of over a thousand, comprising 554 boys and 557 girls and has already been issued with a Statutory Notice from the department of public health and sanitation, dated 23rd of October 2024 requiring the learning institution to either exhaust or put up new ones within a period of 14 days from the date of the notice.
The notice stressed that failure to the warning will attract stern legal action, against the school board of management, and further dire consequences.
According to a copy of the Statutory Notice availed to this publication by the headteacher, the public health and sanitation department had established that the dilapidated filled up pit latrines that exposed fecal matters to the flies posed a serious threat to the lives of the pupils and the community at large.
Mr. Kowiyo who was flanked by the school management board chairman Mr Nashon Ogada and the Parents’ Asociation (PA) chairman Mr Albert Calvin Otieno, at the same time said that the school does not have adequate cash in its account that could facilitate the construction of new pit latrines.
“As we speak, our hands as the school Board of Management are tied owing to lack of adequate funds in the school account that can help us in putting up new pit latrines. That is why we are appealing to area lawmaker Hon. Rosa Buyu and her Ng-CDF committee to come to the rescue of the school, as schools are opened in January next year,” he said.
The chairman, Mr Nashon Ogada on his part supported the replacement of the existing pit latrines saying the floors as well as the entire toilet building has developed major cracks, a situation he said was putting the lives of the pupils at a greater risk.
“The floors of the toilets have major cracks and.so our fear is that they can sink in hence the need to take an emergency step to save the situation before it goes out of hand,” he emphasized.
However, the school management board lauded the area Member of Parliament and her Ng-CDF committee for putting up three modern classrooms that would be handed over to the school later.
