The ManicaPost
Morris Mtisi Education Correspondent
AT the time schools, parents and the nation are worried about the wayward moral behaviour of students, the five girl learners from Herentals College in Mutare, illustrated that hope is not lost. They were on Diamond FM Radio recently on an Education programme called Head-To-Head with MM. They bravely revealed their challenges as girls and particularly as girl learners and showed an enormous willingness to change into better-behaved girls, given the chance.
Grace Nezomba was the first to cite male school teachers who dated girl learners. “This is outright abuse,” she said.
“How can a male teacher to whom every learner must turn for protection and counselling see a potential girlfriend in a girl entrusted in his hands by her parents behave like that? Where do we turn to when we are at school? Some of our parents are absent from home or dead. What do we do?”
All the four girls concurred with Nezomba when they said the world is cruel today and there is no one to trust. “Everyman is a potential abuser or rapist. We meet them on the street, on buses, at school, at their work places, in social places like shows and other places of entertainment . . . and it feels like it a crime to be a girl . . . especially a beautiful one. Every man wants to eat you wherever you meet him. It is sad. When do we concentrate on our work? When do we become focused on our education and dreams in life.”
“We all have dreams, you know,” emphasised Tattyana supposedly to mean I did not know. “Men and boys too, are busy shattering our hopes, wishes and aspirations in life. They prematurely remind us we are their sexual comforters and pain killers . . . seemingly suggesting we were not created for anything else better, except to quench their sexual hunger or thirst. That’s tragically sad and wrong.” The Herentals’ girls are members of the Girls of Substance Movement which was informally launched last year in September at St Augustine’s High School and to be formally or officially launched by the First Lady at the same venue on 22 June 2019, less than two weeks to come.
The Girls of Substance Movement seeks to reduce celebrations of moral decay in schools and hopefully in life thereafter. It seeks to reduce student prostitution in schools, colleges and universities, narcotic drug consumption and substance abuse and other forms of wayward moral decadence.
Parents who have no idea what their children are into and up to in the schools, colleges and universities they go to will be shocked to know. The moral standards of youngsters who have no parents at home and have no source of guidance have gone to the dogs.
Those who have parents around and some form of guidance do not listen, act irresponsibly, immorally and act dangerously loose. They will do anything and everything society says NO to, and damn the consequences. STI’s, HIV or AIDS, unwanted babies, dropping out of school . . . damn it all! The level of immorality even in the schools is frightening.
Answering MM’s question on radio, “Do male teachers who date girl learners date all girls in the school, or are guided by particular girls who openly seduce them?” The programme opened up a can of worms.
“You are very correct. Some girls ask for it; others literally advertise themselves by the way they dress and talk. We cannot blame the teachers alone. It is the mad teacher and the mad girl who end up hooked up in a mad dance of sexual immorality. Some cut shorter their school skirts and walk around literally naked,” said Tadiwa Pambuka.
I asked the girls, “Is there something we adults can look forward to understanding about this level of moral decay? Why do young girls and boys, still in school, colleges and universities behave worse than wild animals? Without losing temper and without condemning anyone, for they are all our children, is there something anything sensible us old and old fashioned nincompoops can appreciate about your Hell . . . just one thing?”
Tattiyana was quick to come in . . . quick witted, intelligent and surprisingly sound minded. “Let me tell you about my experience about going out kumusha and how it helped me to appreciate our beliefs, customs and cultural values.”
She then went on to succinctly narrate her experiences, her English is sharp, in fluid and beautiful language, and ended up saying, “I’m now a different creature. I even herded cattle for some days and for the first time realised how much touch with the real world we lose when we bury our heads on television, glued on radio, WhatsApp and think WIFI is heaven.
It is good to go home once in a while and run away from the false and dangerous glory of town or city life. Most of us have turned away completely from our cultural values and made us lose the substance the GIRLS OF SUBSTANCE MOVEMENT seeks to restore in us. Thanks to the Movement.
We cannot wait to meet the First Lady and her team of Women of Substance at St Augustine’s High School on June 22 2019. We strive to grow into women of substance once the period of girls of substance is over,” she said.
Talking to the girls on radio was an eye-opener. No matter how misguided some of them are and deeply entrenched in celebrating moral decay . . . no matter what we may think about them and the future that seems so distant and bleak, there remains a silver lining in every dark cloud. These girls are ready to be guided. They are ready to listen and change . . . even the almost beyond-repair cases. So long as there is still a breath of fresh air in every human being’s life, there is always a chance of changing for the better . . . God helping them. It is the willingness that God wants . . . then He uses it to bless and change whatever is black to white.
Despite the mbanjes, Broncos, the wild libidos enhanced by poisonous drugs . . . despite the notorious vuzu parties that resemble parties celebrated in hell . . .despite the behavioural and spiritual deaths commonly experienced, there is hope in every child.
If God worked on Saul and made Paul out of him, there is no human being He can fail to change.
If Jesus turned water into sweet wine, how can he fail to change little sinners in schools into sweet young boys and girls? All they need is to be guided to help change themselves through the power and love of the living God and kept away physically, mentally and spiritually from Satan who rejoices when His children mess themselves and those around them.
The war Satan is waging against God is live and raging. The Great controversy started in Heaven. Satan was defeated and removed from Heaven.
He retains his power and influence. He did not fall on earth alone. He was followed by a formidable army of angels that were accomplices in his rebellion against God. Today Satan and his formidable ‘‘angels’’ attack everything that is God’s.
Zimbabweans must pray for their children not to join the devil’s breakfast parties or Hell’s angels to spite God. The Girls of Substance in schools are willing to turn each her life from Death to Life . . . from moral death to spiritual and mental regeneration.
Herentals Group of Schools and Colleges, with 45 branches or centres in Zimbabwe, are committed to raising the Girls of Substance Movement’s flag and letting its Moral Rearmament star shine.
Herentals Group of Schools and Colleges are the proud sponsors of the Diamond FM Radio education programme called Head-To-Head with MM.
