Before lighting that match to raze a dorm, my friend, think
A dormitory that was gutted in a Sunday evening fire at St Luke's Kimilili Boys in Bungoma County.
Until last week’s school break, cases of student unrest had hit an all-time high, with incidents being reported almost every day.
We witnessed learners holding demonstrations, vandalising school property and burning dorms and libraries
Asked why, some said their food rations were small and the quality bad, or that entertainment hours and others that teachers were mistreating them. Dear friends, such issues will always be with us. This means we will have to find a way to live with such issues. Trouble comes when we take the law into our own hands. We do this in the name of making our voices heard.
But this is not the way to go. We have many alternative channels of reaching our teachers and school administrations.
Let us embrace dialogue to present our issues. We should understand that such is school life and it is not going to get any easier, for it is through sacrifice that success is achieved.
We should also think about the consequences of our actions. Some students have been hauled before the courts and charged.
As the rest of us learn, they are struggling to cope with the dog’s life in remand. We should think about the people who may be affected by our actions. For example, we lose a place to sleep and are sent home on suspension. As for our parents, they bear the heavy reconstruction costs.
Also, always remember the warning by the police on Twitter that “let each student be informed that all offenses will be reflected on the police clearance certificate when such a student applies for one.” The offenses listed were armed and violent demonstrations, drugs and arson. “This will be a permanent criminal mark that will bar many students from achieving their goals, as no employer of worth will dare employ such characters,” DCI added.
We should agree that burning of school property is an uncivilised way of making our voices heard.
Think of the future generation of students before setting that building on fire. My fellow students, let us not burn our schools.
Korir is a Form Four candidate at Kapsabet Boys’ High School.
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