It seems there must be interested parties who do not want children to be educated. Educated people learn to think for themselves, to ask questions, to not accept every piece of information fed to them to suit another's agenda.

What were local chiefs and headmen thinking about? Were they not aware there were no textbooks in schools? If not, why not? Was nobody in the area concerned, at the start of the school year, to raise the matter?

We know that when the matter was raised, there were books stashed in storerooms, and books shredded and destroyed.

We also have people destroying schools, in the hope of persuading authorities to tar roads. Where is the money supposed to come from to tar and rebuild the schools?

People who are not properly educated are not in a position to think about these consequences. They will accept what is the popular idea at the moment. This leads to irrational deeds like burning witches, or trying to treat HIV by having sex with children.

With education, we can move on to living in the 21st century, but there must be a national desire for this and private, vested interests must not be allowed to destroy these aspirations.