Taking the boat to school in flooded Western Kenya

Some Kenyan students in Kisumu county, close to the overflowing Lake Victoria, are forced to take a boat to school, only to find waterlogged classrooms and no teachers on site. Public schools have reopened in Kenya following a closure ordered by the government in March 2020 to curb the spread of Covid-19.

The flooding has made parents to spend more in maintaining their kids attendance to schools despite the beckoning dangers

“When the coronavirus came all the pupils stayed home, but today the schools reopen and we are forced to take them back to their original schools where they were learning. But it’s impossible as the school is marooned and the only way to reach it is through water transport in boats. But they have to eat lunch and we also pay the boat fare again in the evening for the return,” a parent said.

The floods now poise high risks to the learners as some of them are expected to compete with other students and schools in the upcoming national examinations.

“There is a lot of water in the school. We cannot learn like the others (in other schools), but we will sit the same national exams,” a student told journalists.

Kenya has had almost 97,000 cases and over 1,600 deaths since the start of the outbreak, with a surge in its positivity rate of up to 20 percent in October decreasing to below five percent in the past week.