Political leaders in Kericho County have proposed a return to corporal punishment and criminal prosecution, as well as transferring students to approved schools, in a bid to address the rising cases of unrest in schools.
Led by Senator Aaron Cheruiyot and Belgut MP Nelson Koech, the leaders believe that these reforms would put an end to unrest in schools.
They noted that current laws failed to deliver appropriate punishments and allowed students to flout the rules at will.
According to the leaders, this tough action would put an end to cases of arson, strikes, and destruction of property in schools.
“Any student who burns a school should not be treated as a student, they should be treated as a criminal. There is no place for such a student in the normal punishment system, that student should be put in jail and transferred to an approved school,” Koech noted.
“This policy of banning corporal punishment in schools, where did it come from? I read the Bible and there is a verse that says spare the rod and spoil the child,” Cheruiyot opined.
Student Unrest in Kericho Schools
Their message came amid the rise in student unrest in schools, particularly in their Kericho backyard, with Litein Boys High School recently grabbing headlines for setting parts of the school on fire on Sunday, September 21.
The unrest reportedly began after the administration denied the students an opportunity to watch the much-anticipated English Premier League match between Arsenal and Manchester City.
Sources within the school revealed that the students had requested to view the 90-minute match under the usual weekend entertainment schedule, a practice common in many boys' schools. However, the administration declined the request, triggering unrest among the learners.
The situation quickly escalated into a full-blown strike, with the students resorting to violence to express their anger towards the school administration. In the aftermath, dormitories and classrooms were engulfed in smoke, with property worth millions of shillings destroyed.
According to videos and images circulating online, several school blocks were torched, leaving behind charred walls and debris.
Besides Litein, a dormitory at Tengecha Boys High School in Kapkatet, Bureti Sub-County, Kericho County, was burnt down on the night of Tuesday, September 23, destroying property of an unknown value.
Reports indicated the inferno began at around 8pm in what some believed could have been a result of an arson attack on the building, which hosts more than 100 students.
According to witnesses, the dormitory was set ablaze moments after a section of the students went on a rampage. However, the locals quickly intervened and stopped the students from protesting.
While the main reason for the protests was unclear, the residents swiftly put out the flames, which had already destroyed a huge chunk of the storey building.
The two incidents at Litein and Tengecha Boys High Schools follow a similar occurrence at Cheptenye Boys High School, which is also located in Kericho County.
The Cheptenye incident took place on September 11, after a group of learners reportedly set two dormitories ablaze while most of the students were attending their afternoon lessons. However, no injuries or casualties were reported.
