THE story about 97 students in Kahama who were denied their right to sit for this year's National Form Four Examinations just because they lacked some qualification document that appeared on Page One of Tuesday's edition of this newspaper is really a heartbreaker.

It was disturbing news indeed to think that the effort put by the poor students, who are in fact children, for the past four years had gone down the drain through no fault of theirs but out of sheer negligence by officials and teachers responsible.

Just imagine a scenario in which students who gave their all in their four-year course of study and who were looking forward to face their final examinations after a period of studying and preparing hard being told off at the very doorstep of an examination room!

Consider too, the shock parents who had been digging deep into their pockets to pay for their children's education would undergo on hearing about this. By the way, is Kahama the only case, for asking out aloud?The students themselves have expressed shock over the incident, maintaining that they had filled all the required documents in addition to paying the required fees.

Yet when names were called by none other than the school's headmaster himself, 53 out of 150 students were told to get out of the exam room.This incident must have shocked not only the students themselves but also their parents and the entire nation.

If our memory saves us right, this is not the first time such or a near-similar examination room incident is happening in the country when some students were denied access to an examination just because the school had not sent their names to examination authorities.

As indicated above, the said students are mere children; it is no business of theirs to ask about which forms to fill and when. It is up to the school's authorities and other responsible officials in the ministry of education's hierarchy to do that for them. The fact that this was done is proof that someone, somewhere did not do his or her work properly.

We believe that some effort will be made to ensure that these students sit for their exams, however late. It is their right. And whoever is responsible for this mess must be appropriately taken to task.