Published by the government of Zimbabwe
4 September 2007
Harare — Trust schools say they will comply with the new law when setting school fees for the third term, but have asked for an extension of 14 working days, beginning today, so they can revise budgets, call for the necessary parents' meetings and submit their applications.
Last week, President Mugabe invoked the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act to outlaw the use of the consumer price index in setting fees as part of a set of deflationary measures covering the next six months. Many of the trust schools had set provisional fees based on estimates of the CPI for August. Parents were told that if the final official CPI was lower than the estimate, then the excess fees raised would be refunded.
The rest of the schools had set interim fees equivalent to the second term fees, but warned parents that the final fees would be set once the CPI for August was available and that this would almost certainly be far higher.
All new fees and levies, and all increases in fees and levies, now have to be approved by the National Incomes and Pricing Commission in advance. The commission must look at the actual costs of operating and maintaining the school, programmes for improving facilities, representations by parents or on behalf of pupils, and relevant economic factors.
Chairman of the Association of Trust Schools Mr Jameson Timba wrote to the commission yesterday seeking an extension of what amounts to the next three weeks so that the 62 schools in his association can go through all the processes to comply with the new law. Under the regulations issued last week, the President temporarily amended the Act setting up the commission and the Education Act. Each non-government school has to give full details of the increase desired, the basis for the calculation, and proof that a majority of parents at a meeting approved the increase.
The commission then, after considering costs, proposed improvements, representations by or on behalf of parents or pupils, and other relevant economic factors justifying the proposed increase, can approve the figure, amend it, or reject the application.
The regulations do not impose a general freeze on school fees and do away with the requirement that tuition fees can only be 40 percent of boarding fees, both positions welcomed by Mr Timba. But the regulations mean the schools have to relook at all proposed costs. In the first and general part of the regulations, the President forbade anyone from indexing salaries, service charges or prices to the CPI, any exchange rate for the Zimbabwe dollar or any anticipated increase in the CPI or exchange rate.
Mr Timba said all schools would have to revise their budgets according to the provisions of these regulations, having particular regard to the costs. Once they had done this, they had to call parents' meetings and then submit the agreed fee applications to the commission.
"The above request (for a 14-business day extension) is intended to avoid disrupting the operations of schools during this public examinations term as happened previously. We are also, as we are required to do, taking further legal advice on the new law, and our responsibilities as educational authorities.
"We hope the above arrangements will meet the need to duly uphold the law and at the same time ensure the smooth administration and continued provision of the necessary services in our education system."
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