The ManicaPost
TWO Manicaland schools took the lion’s share of awards in the 2019 French public speaking championship competitions held in Bulawayo.
The schools are St Mary Magdeline’s, an Anglican Church owned school beyond the beautiful mountains of Nyanga and Mutare Girls’ High, where the beautiful girls get their strength from the mountains (Ex Montibus robus).
The two boys and four girls were on Diamond FM Radio on the education programme called Head To Head with MM where they awed listeners with intriguing snippets of perfect exhibition of the French language. No wonder five of the ten winners came from Manicaland. These are Rumbidzai Mukwada (Mutare Girls) who came out first in the championships, Romana Angel Marovanyanga (Mutare Girls), Tafara Dzengedza ( St Mary ), Emily Masocha (St Mary), Peter Makoto (St Mary) and Tanya Mugidho (Mutare Girls).
The most beguiling part of the story is that two of the Alliance Francaise winners are Form 2 students — Emily Makoto and Tafara Dzengedza — both from St Mary Magdeline’s.
The French-language learners illustrated mesmerising mastery of French on radio and revealed alluring dreams: Rumbidzai Mukwada she said she wanted to become an immigration lawyer and or part time presidential French translator after school. Romana Angel revealed that she wanted to work in any French embassy anywhere in the world.
The students are going to Windhoek-Namibia in December to represent Manicaland and Zimbabwe in the Orate Africa Public Speaking Championships. Their stars continue to shine. Their dreams continue to grow bigger. And may their teachers (Mrs Maureen Buzuzi-Mutare and Mr Anesu Kanengoni) continue to inspire them and others.
“It is humbling to hear the learners revealing how we have impacted their lives,” said Mrs Buzuzi-Mutare.
“Through the study of French these boys and girls make us proud. Not only that; they have enlarged their perspective of the world and found an easy way into the Francophone community,” she said.
At one point Mrs Buzuzi-Mutare was the only French teacher in Manicaland.
Mr Kanengoni concurred with his colleague. Birds of a feather. . . !
“More schools are taking up French as a learning area and our school based community is growing. We are happy. For me French is a calling and I will continue to do the best I can to inspire students to learn it and learn it well,” said Mr Kanengoni.
“We have done extremely well so far . . . not only as St Mary and Mutare Girls, but as a province. We shall continue to do well. But our serious snag at the moment is shortage of money to fund the Namibia trip and participation in the Alliance Francaise championships in December,” he added.
He appealed to well-wishers, the corporate world and individuals to donate in cash or kind towards funding the trip to Namibia.
“Can we use this opportunity to appeal for donations?” he asked. “We want money and several items we need to make our trip possible . . . and we do not have that money as of now,” Mr Kanengoni revealed.
Diamond FM and The Manica Post, through a social obligation contract, assured the schools to be in it together and play their part in accomplishing such a noble mission.
