St Charles Lwanga Ichuni Girls High School principle Joyce Ogutu in a picture taken on October 07, 2014. She is accused of confining students to cells she set up in the school. Some of her student victims claim to have been detained for days without a bath and with only breakfast and super a day. PHOTO | DENISH OCHIENG ADVERTISEMENT A school in Kisii County is on the spot after its headteacher was accused of locking up errant students in cell-like rooms and subjecting them to cruelty and degrading treatment. A parent with a child at St Charles Lwanga Ichuni Girls Secondary School said that students who fell foul with the headteacher were locked up in the cells, sometimes for up to two weeks. One of the cells has been named “Higher Chamber” and is used to detain girls who have committed offences deemed to be serious, such as failing examinations or buying sweets from across the school fence. “Here, students can be stripped and water poured on the ground with the students being forced to sleep on the ground,” said the parent who requested not to be identified to save her child from victimisation. “My daughter, who has undergone the inhumane treatment in the cells, tells me that they were being provided with meals twice a day; breakfast at 9am and dinner at 10pm.” Up to nine students, the parent said, were being forced to share a mattress, meaning that those who failed to find space would sleep on the cold floor overnight. “They are not allowed to shower,” the father said. “They are not allowed to go out except once at 10pm for long calls and then they are herded back.” According to her, the “offenders” use paint cans the rest of the time. In one instance, a student in detention developed an asthmatic attack. “Those inside the cell had to bang the door forcing the night guard to intervene,” he said. SIX BAGS OF CEMENT After the students have served time, their parents are required to send six bags of cement to the school as part of the punishment. According to him, teachers are unhappy with these curious punishments but there is nothing they can do. On Wednesday, the school’s headteacher, Ms Joyce Orioki, called the Nation and promised to travel to Kisii to give her side of the story but she hadn’t by Thursday. The Nation called her back and she said she was in a meeting after which she would return the call but didn’t. When the Nation team visited the school on Tuesday, Mrs Orioki declined to talk and ordered them out of the school premises. It was only after they returned with police officers that they were allowed to visit the squalid cells. Some students secretly passed on notes to the Nation team in which they asked for help. One note written in Kiswahili read: “Shule yenyewe ni cell. Mbili ziko lower field na moja iko hapa between class Three Challenge na English department. “Wanafunzi wakiingishwa cell hakuna kupewa food, kuona hata maji…kujisaidia ni huko huko na pia kulala. (The school itself is a cell. There are two cells on the lower field and another one between Form Three Challenge and the English Department. If taken there, students are not given food or water. They relieve themselves and spend the night there as well)”. Some of the notes alleged that sick students were denied treatment while others alleged they had been caned.
Posted on: Fri, 10 Oct 2014 10:15:36 +0000
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