Tourism benefits trickling down to education: the case of Simoonga village in Livingstone

Mr Ng'uni inspecting construction works.

WHAT started as a village tour of Simoonga in the tourist capital, Livingstone, was later to bring benevolent tourists that would give a ray of hope to underprivileged children.

Hundreds of underprivileged children are now attending school, at no fee, thanks to the Livingstone culture of getting tourists to visit villages to acquaint themselves with the way of life of poor rural communities.

It just took two generous tourists to give a major facelift and financial boost to a once-upon-a-time small school in the village that now has 400 pupils and 19 members of staff.

The school has continued to touch the hearts of foreign tourists, some of whom return to volunteer as teachers in a village located about 17 kilometres from Livingstone, along the Livingstone-Sesheke road.

In a nutshell, that is the story of Simoonga Thandizani Trust School located on the Livingstone-Sesheke road.

By virtue of Livingstone being a tourist capital and Simoonga village being located on the highway, it is included on the tourism package of the tour operators, in the same way as Maramba and Mukuni villages.

Simoonga is home to approximately 3,000 inhabitants, predominantly Lozi and Tonga-speaking people.

Legend has it that the village, which is situated along the main road which runs parallel to the Zambezi River as it flows down towards the Victoria Falls, was founded in 1958.

The school started with five children in 2010, but the story is now different. It was set up by someone without any formal teaching background, Edwin Ng'uni, 42.

Mr Ng'uni, a father of four, has a Grade 12 school certificate from Mukusi Secondary School, one that doesn't exist anymore.

We caught up with Mr Ng'uni, who is director at the school whose 400 pupils do not pay anything apart from the K20 monthly affiliation fee.

He shared with us his story. “I was born in Chief Chitungulu’s Chiwolele Village, in Lundazi district. I went to Chitungulu primary school, Lumimba Secondary and completed at Mukusi Secondary school here in Livingstone,” he says.

Mr Ng'uni, who once worked as an assistant teacher at Tongabezi Trust School, not too far from Simoonga says it was from there that he conceived the idea of opening a school. Before that, he was working as an elephant handler at one of the Lodges within the vicinity.

“I worked there (Tongabezi Trust School) for one year and it was during that time that I developed the passion to help the children in my community,” he says. “I started with just five children that I was teaching in my house.”

Then the school started to grow little by little. “We then put up this structure,” he says while pointing to an old two-room structure.

The community being in the tourist corridor, the school used to receive quite a number of visitors in the form of tourists. It is from one such visitor that the fortunes for Simoonga Thandizani Trust School changed.

“I built this old structure from the donation we received from an American couple that came to visit us one day, while on their village tours,” he says.

Mr Ng'uni checking on food stocks.

The biggest turnaround, however, came when another tourist in the name of Tammy Farley visited the school.

After being impressed with what she saw, she felt the need to reach out to the school and asked Mr Ng'uni what she could do to help.

“I told her she could come in with the feeding programme. She agreed and she has never backed out ever since,” he says.

Today, all the 400 children children at the school are given free breakfast and lunch. “We figured that the number of pupils increased as a result of the feeding programme we have in place,” Mr Ng'uni says.

The school which uses the Government-approved curriculum, now has 19 members of staff who include 10 teachers, two cooks, one general worker, two security guards, an office manager, a bookkeeper and Mr Ng'uni himself as director.

From Ms Farley’s funding and donations from mostly foreign well wishers, the school built a two-room classroom block for pre-graders in 2016 and later in 2018, a similar structure for grades one and two, including an administration block.

“The same year (2018), we built and opened a 1 x 3 classroom block for grades 3, 4 and 5, while the other one for those in Grades 6 and 7 was built somewhere between October and December 2019,” says Mr Ng'uni.

He says running the school has not been easy but he does not have any regrets. “When I started this project, I had no teaching credentials. I still don’t have. But I do this because of the passion I have for children and education itself. If I cannot go to university or college, at least I can build the foundation for these children to do so,” Mr Ng'uni says.

“We have had our own challenges but I am glad that we are were we are today.” The only regret Mr Ng'uni has is about not securing big land to accommodate his big dream.

Silvia Borlini

“I didn’t know that we would grow this fast and this big. As you can see, the space is too compact and how I wish I had secured a bigger piece of land,” he says.

Italian Silvia Borlini, 30, one of the volunteers at Simoonga Thandizani Trust School, says she has had an amazing time teaching and mentoring children.

Because of its location in the tourist capital, Simoonga Thandizani Trust School has since inception attracted over 20 volunteers from different countries such as Mexico, German, France, Italy, and the United States of America.

“I have been here for three months and I will be returning to Italy soon. My stay here has been one of the greatest in my life and I will miss these kids. I have been mentoring and teaching them a lot of things, including Italian and art,” Ms Borlini says.

Jacqueline Kakoma, a recently graduated teacher who works for Simoonga Thandizani Trust School, says she is happy there because the conditions of service for members of staff are good.

“I am an early childhood teacher and it has been amazing teaching these children. I am not complaining about the pay here because it is as good as for those in Government,” she says.

Febby Manjolo is the headteacher at the school and she shares that the school has helped many children, who mostly come from vulnerable households, to set foot in class. Simoonga Thandizani Trust School caters for pre-graders and grades one to seven.

“Our teaching basically takes a full day. In the afternoon we do extracurricular activities such as recycling [plastic materials to make artefacts],” Ms Manjolo says. The Simoonga community has two other schools - Tongabezi Trust School and Simoonga Primary and Secondary School.

Jacqueline Kakoma

Rural education is important not only for the enhancement of the quality of life for the rural community, but also for the overall progress and development of the country.

Mr Ng'uni says he will stop at nothing to ensure that no child in Simoonga is left behind in terms of access to education.

“That is why I am working with trained professionals here to ensure that we have quality,” he says.