Joseph Opilo carefully moves his hands along two metallic bed rails lined on either side in order to gain stability as he moves.
The six-year-old was born blind and has had to learn to use his hands and feet to ‘see’. When he was four years old, Opilo’s parents told him he could do anything the normal children would and that they would enroll him into a special-needs school when he turned five.
His parents bred Opilo with so much determination that when he enrolled into school last year, he was ready to learn how to read and write, according to Maureen Ayabotho, one of the two special-needs teachers at Pajobi primary school.
“He is a fast learner. In just one year that he has been here, he has been able to learn to tell what type of animal has been carved out of a wooden craft,” says Ayabotho.
Located in Nebbi town council, the school is famed for having one of the oldest units that provide formal education to blind pupils. In line with the education ministry’s policy on inclusive education, the school caters to both blind and sighted learners. The school’s current enrolment is 902, with three of these being completely blind, while another two partially blind.
Gofin Okumu, another special-needs teacher at the school, is an alumnus of the school. The teacher, who was blinded by measles during his infancy, testifies that hundreds of blind pupils from the unit have enrolled into secondary school.
“Anything that the sighted pupils can do, the blind can also do and we are teaching blind pupils to survive and excel amid difficult situations,” Okumu tells The Observer.
The blind unit uses the comprehensive curriculum for basic education and runs the regular school calendar of three terms in one academic year.
BLINDING CHALLENGES
However, testimonies of hardship in this unit are moving. For starters, the blind pupils are restricted to a one classroom that doubles as their dormitory, also catering to both male and female pupils.
When we join the team from ActionAid Uganda at Pajobi, we find Jennifer Atimango, one of the three completely-blind pupils, laying her bed, as she readies herself for class. Atimango shares this room with Opilo and another boy, as well as the partially-blind pupils, a boy and a girl. Thus the room has six beds for the learners.
After five minutes, she has negotiated her way through the narrow path separating the girls’ beds from the boys’, in order to ‘get to’ class. Her classroom, at the front of the room, features three chairs and one desk.
This unit has no library and the pupils have to rely entirely on their teacher’s notes. Atimango, who says she hopes to become a lawyer one day, has no choice but to work with what is available. Paulino Avola, Pajobi’s head teacher, is beside himself with explanations for the trying circumstances.
“There is a big challenge of lack of infrastructure and scholastic materials such as braille paper and braille machines. And we have not received the quarterly funding of Shs 2.5m for the blind unit for one and half years now,” adds Avola.
To make ends meet and ensure that the unit keeps functioning, Avola says, the school administration keeps borrowing money from the Parents and Teachers Association.
To add to the challenges, the blind pupils have to share the school’s only two latrine stances with other children. As if to compound their sight problem, the blind unit does not have electricity to light it at night.
APPEAL
Avola has since decided to appeal to government to provide more infrastructure at the school, such as building more latrines and dormitories.
“[We appeal to] government to fulfill its funding promise, so that we are able to have operational equipment such as talking calculators and braille books availed and on time.”
For now, Avola tells The Observer that the number of blind pupils has dropped from 11 to three in 2015, due to the numerous challenges faced by the learners at the school.
ninsiima@observer.ug