Following the Declaration of State of Disaster by the President of Malawi Professor Peter Mutharika due to the outbreak of Coronavirus in the country, schools were instructed to close indefinitely. However, this did not go down well with a number of stakeholders demanding Government to re-open schools while others wishing to maintain the status quo.

Since the closure of schools on March 23, 2020, about six million school-going children in Malawi have been grounded at home a situation which some education experts described it as worrisome.

Separately, other teachers have argued that if schools get re-opened it would be hard to contain the pandemic especially on primary school children.

“When it’s cold, children cough, how will teachers stop other children from saying the coughing child has Corona? How will the teachers get the children keep their masks on all the time, and how will the teachers stop children from touching everything around them? all these questions need thoughtful answers before deciding to re-open schools”, clarified some teachers who opted for anonymity.

With this hot debate, Government through the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology formed a tasked force on 15 May, 2020 to oversee and map way forward on whether to re-opening schools before the year ends. Some notable members of the task force include; Prof. Lewis Dzimbiri, who is the Chairperson from Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Justin Saidi, who is Secretary for Education, Science and Technology, Benedicto Kondowe from Civil Society Education Coalition, Rev. Fr. George Buleya from Association of Private Universities in Malawi, Charles Kamanga from Teachers Union of Malawi, Joseph Patel from Independent Schools Association of Malawi,  Dr Limbani Nsapato from Edukans,  and Br. Pascal Mtwana from Association of Christian Education in Malawi.

Commenting on this, Executive Director for Civil Society Education Coalition Mr. Benedicto Kondowe said that if heath assessment provides an indication that the country could still re-open schools then priority would be restricted to Standard 8, Form 4, IGSCE and fourth year students in Universities and Colleges.

Chipping in on the same, Dr. John Phuka from College of Medicine who is also a member of the Presidential Taskforce on COVID-19 warned that rushing in re-opening schools with the current situation would be risky to children and teachers as the pandemic is still on the rise.

But is Government ready to re-open schools? And how will the machinery body ensure that students are well protected from the pandemic when schools re-open?