It is welcome to note that Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai is active for the promotion of girls’ education in Pakistan for the last several months. She is visiting Punjab these days to review condition of   public schools for girls with a view to apprising herself about  their problems regarding education equality,  lack of facilities like safe transportation, potable water etc.

Earlier, she visited Sindh rural districts during the floods to witness for herself the floods devastations which also damaged a great number of girls schools in Sindh and other provices.

To be very specific, Malala Yousafzai has been making hectic efforts and has been working with the Govt of Pakistan and the Malala Fund’s partners to resolve the long-standing issues and problems being faced by girls’ students in the country so that our girls have access to quality education to realise their dreams and become empowered in their future dreams.

In fact, Malala’s focus is on finding a ‘Way Forward’ for girls students on the education front.

In fact, Malala Funds and other international NGOs can  help rebuild the damaged schools across the country so that the future of millions of children can be saved from ruins.

It may be recalled here that Malala’s Yousufzai’s education fund titled ‘Malala Fund Pakistan and its Education Champions Network’ has also organized a discussion on “Driving the Girls’ Education Agenda in Pakistan - Current Status and the Way Forward”, in which over 50 representatives from various fields of life including law-makers, representatives of the government, NGOs,  educationists with special focus on girls education participated.

The dialogue participants were unanimous on their demand for addressing the challenges arising out of issues like child marriages, lack of transpiration facilities for girls students and inequality issues in education. Malala also called  upon Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Parvez Elahi and discussed with him the different issues reported to her by school girls  like corporal punishment issue in schools and madressahs, shortage of science as well as mathematics teachers in schools, particularly district south, which also faces the issues of the shortages of colleges and high schools in south Punjab. Since Malala is at the helm of affair of Malala Educational funds, she can also help the children especially girls whose education has been stalled due to flood-devastations.

Her earlier visit to Sindh province in October this year also coincided with the World Day of the Girl Child, held on October 11 every year to recognise girls’ rights, which is in accordance with the objectives of Malala Fund. Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai was in Dadu district’s Johi in October and she was really moved by the plight of the survivors who were displaced by devastating floods.

The Sindh education minister had briefed her about the pathetic state of schools which were damged by floods, stating that 12,000 schools had housed two million children in Sindh alone. The education of these 2m children was affected. Later in his meeting with the Noble laureate, CM Murad Ali Shah, among other devastations of the floods, also highlighted the state of girls education which is badly impacted by the recent floods. As a matter of fact, the natural calamities in the form of unprecedented rains and flash floods have damaged thousands of schools across the country, resulting in cancellation and suspension of education of millions of children in the flood affected areas. Monsoon rains and floods have damaged an estimated 18 thousand public schools in the country, causing an estimated loss of Rs60 billion, as per initial provisional estimates. Another country-wide provisional data collected  from provincial Education Departments of all the our provinces indicate that around eighteen thousands schools have been damaged or destroyed due to the flash floods and torrential rains. Sindh is the most affected with as many as 15,842 schools, followed by 544 in Balochistan, In Southern Punjab, an estimated 1,180 in Punjab have been destroyed by rains and floods. On the other hand, around 5,500 schools are vacated for flood affectees and are being used to accommodate these people displaced by floods.

A rapid needs assessment (RNA) carried out in 12 districts and Tehsils of Balochistan province has discovered  that around one thoussand classrooms were totally damaged (310 in Khuzdar, 198 in Lasbela and 168 in Jhal Magsi), while another 975 classrooms registred partial damages (304 in Khuzdar, 156 in Lasbela and 174 in Jhal Magsi), and around six hundred schools were being used to accomoate the displaced persons in Killa Saifullah, Jhal Magsi and Lasbela districts. As for the KP province, the damage caused to schools is unprecedented in nature. In Swabi alone, over three hundred schools have been completely washed by rains and floods, Similar is the case in Swat, Bannu, D I Khan, Lakki Marwat etc where ab estimated eight thousands schools are fully or partially damaged by floods. Educationists say that this situation will result in unprecedented educational losses in a country where the number of drop-out of school children is already very high. This situation will result in further increase in the number of out-of-school children. As per available date, there are at least 18.7m children who never went to school and do not intend to go either.

Pakistan stands second in the list of countries that have the highest number of out-of-school children. As estimated, 22.8 million children between the age of 5 to 16 years do not go to schools.  The latest statistics of the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund show that these out of school children form 44 per cent of the population in this age group, which is an alarming situation.

Now this is appallingly big out-of-school children number which negates the claims by the successive governments to have launched plans aimed at enrolling more and more children in the schools.

To be very specific, not only educating such a big population of the out-of-school children is a challenge for the government, both federal and provincial, but ensuring international standards within the existing education system is seemingly a very difficult task. Moreover, the creations of jobs creations in the education sector  also does not seem an  easy task as till now it has not  made a real progress. The irony is that education has never been among the top priorities of successive military and civil governments in the country.  Though the successive governments have come up with plans to educate the masses, but those plans were never implemented in letter and spirit. An authentic report says that one in every four Pakistani children had never enrolled in a school.

The figures indicate that there is a very slow pace of progress on education participation as well as closing of the gender gap which is increasing with the passage of time.

Published in The Daily National Courier, December, 16 2022

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