Lusaka as a composite residential area
is divided into two parts we have the
world to do areas that we call my ID and
the impoverished area that we call
company now what is interesting about
Lusaka is that it has a very distinct
special arrangement so that each of
these privileged area would tend to be
very close to a deprived area so
essentially what is happening is that
you have roads dividing affluent areas
and deprived areas so for example some
busy road separates affluent Roma from
poorer Nambe and when you get too much
into road it’s a border between North
mid where the world you do live and
garden or the poorer people now these
roads funny enough might as well be
oceans in the way that we think of
ourselves the affluent tend to talk
about the poor as if there are people in
the zoo or else they have peculiar ways
of a foreign country so generally for
those of us who go to comedian to comedy
shows you will find that every Zambian
comedian has a company joke in their
back pocket so we laugh at the poor we
laugh at their ways we laugh at the
crowded places they sleep with laugh at
the fact that they do not have toilets
and the reason that we are able to do
that is because as the city is laid out
so is this country run the situation is
that on the right side of the road
people are able to enjoy pretty good
amenities things work you have shiny
malls on every corner
generally water runs and if it doesn’t
you can sink Abajo on the other side of
the road though service delivery is
either absent or extreme is our standard
so if you go to my candy you’ll find
that
the home will have five toilets to share
within touching distance of McKenney is
Chavarria they don’t have flushing
toilets
well forget flushing toilets they don’t
have enough pit latrines so you have
thousands and thousands of people living
there sharing pit latrines or otherwise
relieving themselves in whatever way
they think I like to illustrate this
just a little bit further this disparate
divide between the world to do and the
poor people by using the example of
education now as you’d expect the
children growing up in the affluent
areas go to the better schools so these
tend to be functional institutions they
are sporting fields there were small
classes there was extra curricular
activities and well they tried to bring
out around a child at the end of the 12
years and then we visit tend area for
example and they we find something like
that that is a school right outside the
door or the gate of the school someone
is selling secondhand clothing a little
bit further from where I took I’d like
you to note that that school and the
other one I that I took is within two
kilometers of each other if that very
close there’s another school I’d like
you to listen to this for a while
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
school was in session so on this side
there’s a market stall blaring out music
on the other side there’s a bar when it
gets a little bit better that’s a
government school but even in the
government school classes of 80 to 90
and not unheard of so this situation is
the way we are educating our children it
would not be so tragic if it was not for
the paramedical education style we have
in Zambia so our situation is that in
grade one we are capturing almost
hundred percent of our children so
Ministry of Education says about 80 to
90 percent of seven year olds have a
place in grade one but when you get to
grade 12 only about 20 to 30 percent of
those children are in grade 12 that is
simply because we do not have the
classes for all the children so how do
we lose them we have two national
selection examinations at grade 7 and
grade 9 it doesn’t take too much
research to understand which twenty
percent are making it to the end which
is obviously the ones that go to the
better schools we don’t seem to worry
about that too much those of us sitting
here who are able to come to events like
this our children obviously go to the
better to the better schools now not too
long ago I found out that a new boy in
my family who goes to a government
school and was going into grade five
could not read to save his life so he
was at my husband on holiday and I gave
him book a book to read like I usually
do
that’s him there his name is Joe so that
was last year I panicked and I could not
understand how he had reached with five
because I know that his mother while she
herself has not has no education and is
illiterate actually cannot read or write
is very serious about school so Joe goes
to school every single day he is not
truant he has some food and go to school
but he could not read what had happened
I took it upon myself to teach him how
to read so that’s him at my desk at home
he comes to visit every weekend or else
he spends holidays with me in the last
six months
Joe can now read he cannot read at grade
five level but he can read at least by
three level so my question is how did we
lose him he does not have a learning
disability
why couldn’t even read up to grade five
now that’s Joe he’s lucky he has his
grandmother poor Laura what happens to
the rest of our children what a lot
suggest to you is that as a country
those of us I can speak about this
situation do not worry because our own
children are going to the private
schools brought it on the right side of
the road somehow we imagine that when
God decides to create the next set of
children he walks over to the busy road
and he says the intelligent ones Roma
the Darwin’s mommy the creative ones not
meet the unimaginative ones garden but
we have said that about 70 70 percent of
our people are crowded on the wrong side
of the road what that means is that
using a simple law of probability any
naturally occurring trait in our gene
pool is largely on the wrong side of the
road
so our Einstein our Usain Bolt our next
Lucis attorney our Charles mandals are
going to both schools we imagine our
children are smart because they are
getting a hundred percent pass at the
schools they go to the river they are
getting a higher percent pass is because
they are writing the exams that are set
at the level of the other children so no
our children are not geniuses neither
are they the best that this country has
the best that this country has is in the
townships so I’d like to suggest to you
at this time we began to worry about the
masses of children that we are losing
they are our best resource we should do
this for two reasons one is simple
justice every child has a right to reach
their potential we are not saying that
you all have computers we are not saying
they should play hookey
we are saying that this country can
afford with its resources to give every
child a desk a teacher a blackboard and
so that they can make it through out of
poverty but if justice is not your thing
maybe do it for selfishness because
you’ve got to understand that in a
democracy the future of the country is
not determined by the prospects of the
small minority it is weighed down by the
situation in which the majority live so
whether we like it or not the ignorance
the poverty the hunger that we laugh at
who come to visit us if it does not
visit us it will visit our children
thank you
[Applause] [Music]
is divided into two parts we have the
world to do areas that we call my ID and
the impoverished area that we call
company now what is interesting about
Lusaka is that it has a very distinct
special arrangement so that each of
these privileged area would tend to be
very close to a deprived area so
essentially what is happening is that
you have roads dividing affluent areas
and deprived areas so for example some
busy road separates affluent Roma from
poorer Nambe and when you get too much
into road it’s a border between North
mid where the world you do live and
garden or the poorer people now these
roads funny enough might as well be
oceans in the way that we think of
ourselves the affluent tend to talk
about the poor as if there are people in
the zoo or else they have peculiar ways
of a foreign country so generally for
those of us who go to comedian to comedy
shows you will find that every Zambian
comedian has a company joke in their
back pocket so we laugh at the poor we
laugh at their ways we laugh at the
crowded places they sleep with laugh at
the fact that they do not have toilets
and the reason that we are able to do
that is because as the city is laid out
so is this country run the situation is
that on the right side of the road
people are able to enjoy pretty good
amenities things work you have shiny
malls on every corner
generally water runs and if it doesn’t
you can sink Abajo on the other side of
the road though service delivery is
either absent or extreme is our standard
so if you go to my candy you’ll find
that
the home will have five toilets to share
within touching distance of McKenney is
Chavarria they don’t have flushing
toilets
well forget flushing toilets they don’t
have enough pit latrines so you have
thousands and thousands of people living
there sharing pit latrines or otherwise
relieving themselves in whatever way
they think I like to illustrate this
just a little bit further this disparate
divide between the world to do and the
poor people by using the example of
education now as you’d expect the
children growing up in the affluent
areas go to the better schools so these
tend to be functional institutions they
are sporting fields there were small
classes there was extra curricular
activities and well they tried to bring
out around a child at the end of the 12
years and then we visit tend area for
example and they we find something like
that that is a school right outside the
door or the gate of the school someone
is selling secondhand clothing a little
bit further from where I took I’d like
you to note that that school and the
other one I that I took is within two
kilometers of each other if that very
close there’s another school I’d like
you to listen to this for a while
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
school was in session so on this side
there’s a market stall blaring out music
on the other side there’s a bar when it
gets a little bit better that’s a
government school but even in the
government school classes of 80 to 90
and not unheard of so this situation is
the way we are educating our children it
would not be so tragic if it was not for
the paramedical education style we have
in Zambia so our situation is that in
grade one we are capturing almost
hundred percent of our children so
Ministry of Education says about 80 to
90 percent of seven year olds have a
place in grade one but when you get to
grade 12 only about 20 to 30 percent of
those children are in grade 12 that is
simply because we do not have the
classes for all the children so how do
we lose them we have two national
selection examinations at grade 7 and
grade 9 it doesn’t take too much
research to understand which twenty
percent are making it to the end which
is obviously the ones that go to the
better schools we don’t seem to worry
about that too much those of us sitting
here who are able to come to events like
this our children obviously go to the
better to the better schools now not too
long ago I found out that a new boy in
my family who goes to a government
school and was going into grade five
could not read to save his life so he
was at my husband on holiday and I gave
him book a book to read like I usually
do
that’s him there his name is Joe so that
was last year I panicked and I could not
understand how he had reached with five
because I know that his mother while she
herself has not has no education and is
illiterate actually cannot read or write
is very serious about school so Joe goes
to school every single day he is not
truant he has some food and go to school
but he could not read what had happened
I took it upon myself to teach him how
to read so that’s him at my desk at home
he comes to visit every weekend or else
he spends holidays with me in the last
six months
Joe can now read he cannot read at grade
five level but he can read at least by
three level so my question is how did we
lose him he does not have a learning
disability
why couldn’t even read up to grade five
now that’s Joe he’s lucky he has his
grandmother poor Laura what happens to
the rest of our children what a lot
suggest to you is that as a country
those of us I can speak about this
situation do not worry because our own
children are going to the private
schools brought it on the right side of
the road somehow we imagine that when
God decides to create the next set of
children he walks over to the busy road
and he says the intelligent ones Roma
the Darwin’s mommy the creative ones not
meet the unimaginative ones garden but
we have said that about 70 70 percent of
our people are crowded on the wrong side
of the road what that means is that
using a simple law of probability any
naturally occurring trait in our gene
pool is largely on the wrong side of the
road
so our Einstein our Usain Bolt our next
Lucis attorney our Charles mandals are
going to both schools we imagine our
children are smart because they are
getting a hundred percent pass at the
schools they go to the river they are
getting a higher percent pass is because
they are writing the exams that are set
at the level of the other children so no
our children are not geniuses neither
are they the best that this country has
the best that this country has is in the
townships so I’d like to suggest to you
at this time we began to worry about the
masses of children that we are losing
they are our best resource we should do
this for two reasons one is simple
justice every child has a right to reach
their potential we are not saying that
you all have computers we are not saying
they should play hookey
we are saying that this country can
afford with its resources to give every
child a desk a teacher a blackboard and
so that they can make it through out of
poverty but if justice is not your thing
maybe do it for selfishness because
you’ve got to understand that in a
democracy the future of the country is
not determined by the prospects of the
small minority it is weighed down by the
situation in which the majority live so
whether we like it or not the ignorance
the poverty the hunger that we laugh at
who come to visit us if it does not
visit us it will visit our children
thank you
[Applause] [Music]
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