Nairobi - Kenya's education minister said
on Monday that arson was to blame for a weekend blaze that
killed nine pupils at a girls' boarding school, part of a rising
trend of deliberate school fires.
"It was not an accident, it was arson," Minister Fred
Matiang'i said of the fire on Saturday at Moi Girls School in
Nairobi.
The Kenya Red Cross said on its Twitter feed there had been
three other school fires reported in different parts of the
country on Monday.
Many of the fires were set by students protesting harsh
discipline, poor teaching and corruption, said Canadian
Elizabeth Cooper, assistant professor of International Studies
at Simon Fraser University, who spent four years researching the
subject.
Students she interviewed complained about poor food, scarce
teaching materials, harsh teachers, and management that ignored
their concerns. Many compared their schools to prison and said
they destroyed their schools so they could go home.
In one case, boys had drained water tanks and cut phone
lines before setting fire to their principal's car and pushing
it into his home.
They were angry that he had been collecting money from their
parents for three years for a school bus, but had not bought it.
If a pupil needed hospital treatment, the principal drove them
himself and charged the family, she said.
In another case, girls smeared butter on their curtains and
beds before setting them alight, Cooper said. Fires peak just
before exams and mock exams.
"The students always say, 'no one listens to our concerns'."
Around 350 Kenyan schools caught fire from 2015 to 2016,
according to the government. This compared, according to one
academic source, with 76 fires from 2011 to 2013. It was not
clear how many fires were deliberate. Numbers for 2014 were not
available.
Cooper said some schools set on fire have dismissed their
principals afterward. There have been few successful
prosecutions.
Kenya frequently sees deadly protests, including after the
presidential elections held last month. Cooper said students
sometimes cited violent protests by slum residents or university
students that successfully publicised their causes, and sought
to emulate them.
"Students learn that authorities don't respond until they
present a threat," she said. "It's one way for voiceless
citizens to be heard."
But Matiang'i said some arson attacks were also related to
fights over staff appointments in schools, where senior
positions can bring financial rewards.
"Some of the fires we have faced before in the sector are
related to that kind of thing, politicization of school
headship, politicization of responsibility in the education
sector. It is not right," he said in a televised press
conference.
Kenya is East Africa's largest economy but unemployment is
high and corruption is rife, making life difficult for many
ordinary people.
Control of a school can mean not just a government salary
but an opportunity to extort extra money from students and
parents in fees or other charges.