VIEWPOINT : I long for replay of the Weruweru movie

If you are  an old-generation former student, I can confidently state that, the schooling and professional training periods were among your life’s most remarkable; a mixed grill of pain and joy. The same will apply to current students, when their turn for reflections comes.

You did and will continue to acknowledge that the contribution of the education process was considerably big is fashioning you, alongside parents, and the broader community members.

Caning, which, as part of the liberalising-globalising culture, has been despised as barbaric, was a conspicuous part of the schooling sector.

Its enforcement was popularised by the fact that, rather than sympathise with children who had tasted the bitterness of being caned, parents saluted teachers for doing so, and even demanded heavier doses in order to tune and fine-tune the pupils into serious learners.

What’s more, matters were made better (not worse) by the fact that, youngsters had to contend with schools and homes being alternate caning centres, since parents, too, didn’t brook wayward behaviour.

The canes (mostly in boys’ schools) of strict discipline-enforcing teachers were instrumental in grooming serious learners who subsequently became successful and resourceful adults.

Many of today’s outstanding professionals, politicians and business operators trace their success back to that environment which wasn’t, and wasn’t meant to be,  the equivalent of tourist resorts, but, mild versions of military camps. But canes were ‘technical facilitative tools’, the more critical aspects being  education imparted by a cadre of serious, knowledgeable, devoted, respectable and self-respecting teachers, who discharged their responsibilities  with high-level zeal.

The pupil-student ranks were generally reciprocal by being serious, and those who didn’t make it being an exceptionally dull lot.

The recent ‘down-memory-lane’ event in Dar es Salaam for former students of the famous Moshi-based Weruweru  Girls Secondary School was remarkable. It featured  the legendary headmistress, Mama Maria Josephine Kamm,  and some of her students who proceeded to become exemplary achievers in various fields within and beyond the country.

Here’s a powerful quote from her speech at the event: “I know some of you regarded the strict rules and hard work as torture. But I knew you would later remember me for that. I am very proud of you.”

The 76-year-old lady, who headed one of the country’s most shining educational institutions, had a winning formula  whose ingredients included mentoring and a motherly approach. 

Being an ex-Weruweru student is a badge of honour and admiration, as it is for former students of very few other schools, some of which had been models but lost the glory along the way.

Exceptionally good schools that produce students who would later become a rare, role-modelling species  are  rare, what with education being assailed, to a considerable extent, with the commercial-exam passing-job netting virus.

So, replicating the movie starring the likes of Weruweru school, Mama Khan and the Dr Asha Rose-Migiros, is a pipe dream. But I wish I am wrong!

IN PASSING…

‘Man eat man’ and ‘Man eat nothing’ societies were ugly expressions coined in reference to, respectively, Kenya and Tanzania, during hostilities that led to the collapse of the original East African Community in 1977. I’m tempted to craft ‘Traders eat customers’ as a description for those who sell us fake products, such as the one who sold me a ‘brand new phone battery’ that lasted for only two days!

Wilson Kaigarula is the revise editor, The Citizen