Press Release
Last week, there were widespread media reports alleging that:
- twelve pupils had been suspended from Chikankata Secondary School as a result of being involved in sexual activities;
- that the teachers, after catching the pupils in the act, later forced them to repeat the act while they photographed them; and
- that the pupils were caned on their backsides in the headmaster’s office.
The Human Rights Commission (HRC) sent an investigator to Chikankata particularly because those involved are pupils who are generally within the age precincts described as ‘children’. Our officer, in gathering his information, interviewed school authorities including teachers, the District Education Board Secretary as well as the Provincial Education Officer. He also interviewed four parents of some of the pupils involved, who live within Chikankata, and two pupils, a boy and a girl, who were involved in the scandal.
Commissions Findings
Our findings, as a Commission, are that the sex scandal did take place, as reported in the media, and that subsequently, the pupils involved were indeed issued with letters of indefinite suspension. The Commission heard that when these pupils were discovered in the act, the school authorities immediately contacted (by phone) some of the parents/guardians of the concerned pupils. Four of them went to the school and were present when the school authorities interviewed the twelve pupils at around 04:00hours. There were twelve teachers and four parents at the scene.
These parents/guardians all denied the allegation that the pupils were made to repeat the sexual act while teachers photographed them. The two pupils interviewed in Kafue and Lusaka by our investigator also denied this allegation.
Additionally, the same parties also stated that no corporal punishment took place in the headmaster’s office as alleged in the media reports.
Recommendations
The Commission therefore recommends as follows:
- Â That the Ministry of Education should expedite its disciplinary process and communicate to the affected pupils and parents. Currently, pupils are uncertain on whether or not they will be allowed to sit for the final examinations to be held in October, 2013.
- However, that the rules of natural justice should apply to all pupils involved, who should each be given an opportunity to be heard before the final decision is made by the Ministry of Education.
- That the best interest of the child should be considered in arriving at the final decision on the matter. In as much as the children were wrong and deviant, they still remain children whose interest is to complete their education if they are to become useful human resource to our country.
-  Chikankata Secondary School should put in place effective measures to ensure that boys have no access to the girls’ section or hostels at awkward hours.
The Commission is not in support of the children’s irresponsible and immoral behavior. Therefore, the disciplinary procedures applicable should be followed. However, the decision to be made by authorities should be in line with Zambia’s commitment, as a country, to protect children with utmost good faith under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child as well as the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.
Samuel Kasankha
Chief of Information, Education and Training
Building a sustainable Human Rights Culture together
Children do not have the right to sex
There is no law which says that. The law only forbids sex with a minor, meaning sex between an adult and a minor. Sex between minors among themselves is legal in many countries. This is more a moral and cultural question than a legal one. I must admit I dont know much about the law in Zambia concerning trhis particular issue, so maybe some lawyers can enlighten us further. I do however hope they can be allowed to write their exams. They are not the first students to have sex and they will not be the last. They should not be turned into scapegoats and sufere irrepably for what many many others, including many teachers and bloggers have done and got away with, i.e sex while in secondary school.
Iwe fool!! sex when i was in high school was the order of the day. maybe you are just upset you did not have any in school. just suspend the kids for a short while and return them to school
The biggest recommendation should have been that access to information must be made much easier to avoid the rife behavior of speculative reporting. Allegations are a mainstay when there is little to go with.
Such tuma internet websites should be deleted.
In fact it has become a notorious system to exaggerate stories, is worse than The Post Newspaper of between year 2000 – 2013.
Sex is a physiological need from age of puberty,its like drinking water and eating nsima,sexually derived people do all sorts of things,women use cooking sticks men use their hands etc the best thing is to avoid co education boarding schools. Ndaamba buyo!
Read as “deprived”
The fact, despite the insolence behavior of the alleged pupils, is that there is only one door to be responsible in future. nomatter what regulations state, EDUCATION. We cant runaway from the fact that even younger children in our compounds and villages are involved. denying them this right will mean strengthening the vice. culminating into sexual abuses of all forms and crime.
if it was in Saudi Arabia or Sudan, those pupils could have been hanged..children having sex and you call it human rights. Jesus should come out in open and see what he taught his followers, HIV is on the increase people are rationing the pills
The thing you all must not deny is that as teen age boys and girls the hormones are at the most rampant pick jumping up and down, burning in their bodies like wild fires! so the desire to quench it down and of course to explore and need to discover their sexuality is as high at this age that never!..SO what they needed was a lot of Sex education especially in these co education boarding schools. In simple terms i am trying to say the eduaction bodies are partly to blame and there for its not fare to punish the pupils involved severely but with a warning would be justified.
so should we call this report objective?
No. We should call your picture unsavory, disgusting, repulsive, and deprived.
All i am saying is that this so called scandal should have been treated with its utmost confidentiality than exposing it out in the media for public debate. When these are issues concerning our growing children which should be dealt with all possible confidentiality and educate the pupils involved. And the most important thing is that the Preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ should be intensified in these schools for its the only way for rightness.
If girls who fall pregnant r allowed back to school why expell these??, we all lost virginity in our teenage not the best thing though en shld not be encouraged, as much as its not gd these children have right to education. Punish em but don’t deprive em of their right.
If you lost yours at virginity, I didn’t, so stop living in a box and thinking what you did is what we all went through.
In my teen years, the need for a drink and joint dominated all the other needs.First time I took a beer, it was like discovering heaven on earth!
This case is more to do with whether there were any violations of human rights afterwards, e.g. were the pupils given corporal punishment? (caning is considered cruel treatment and violates human rights articles/conventions) Also, were they forced to repeat the act and pictures taken by the teachers? That would constitute further violations. As for the pupils themselves, I suppose they can only be punished in accordance with whatever regulation there is about having sex at school (as long as it doesn’t breach any of their rights) Other issues that may be considered are if any of the pupils are legally underage (cannot consent to sex) or whether any of the teachers ‘partook in carnal knowledge’ of them.
Let those children sit for their exams, introduce sex workshops in schools, to educate the prons and cons of primature sex, i mean bring in our sex experts to deliver sex education, these are our future leaders, dont help the situation by destroying their future, rebuke and repair not the other way round!
i hate sex…i always become worried when its time to
go to bed…
You need counselling, Sex is healthy believe me you need it, dont get me wrong am talking to wapya munzi.
dryness problem? or more he can´t stand?
Most of these ‘children” are over 18. So they are not children. They should be kept away from school and concentrate on their delicacy. They should not pollute the school. School is for learning morals and not to wake up at 04:00 to have s.e.x.
When I was growing up, I was told sex fyabupuba, and I was also told that abakulu balocha…and as a kid I believed…kanshi bufi…these chikankata kids must have discovered that lie as well.
Ha!Ha!Ha! …Iwe “Nomba Ninshi” walifulungana mwaice…efyo ungalasosa ififine
hey!who are sex experts?
People specialised in sex education, eg Dr Manda, traditional elderly women and men can also educate us on sex activities, they touch topics like; a woman/ mans body, at what age is sex right, can a woman/ get pregnant for having sex for the first time, diseases that comes with sex, condoms, orgasm, size, etc, iwe winshikula this is LT, i hope you get the point.
lol…………..abaiche bali dwinkana!!
I have one question to the school authorities. Where was security when the boys sneaked into the girls hostels? Where was the dormitory matron? If I was a parent of any of those children these are the questions I would want answered by the stupid haedmaster n his equally stupid administration. So as u punish those delinquent pupils plz sort out those *****ic teachers as well. Maybe they have compromised the security system so that they also do the same sick things with the pupils. Human rights your report to me is not complete without mentioning the teachers GROSS NEGLIGENCE!
So it was a orgy, 12 pupils at the same time
and your post is showing 04:00am….