Staff Reporter

Redcliff Municipality has announced plans to construct a satellite secondary school in Rutendo to address the growing demand for secondary education in the area.

Speaking on the development, Acting Director of Housing and Community Services, Ernest Chigwagwa, said the school project has been included in the municipality’s 2025 budget at an estimated cost of US$205,000.

“We want to construct a satellite school in Rutendo. We budgeted for it in our 2025 budget, and it’s at a cost of US$205,000,” said Chigwagwa.

The municipality aims to complete construction by the end of the year to ensure the new school is operational by the next academic year.

“We expect to end construction by the end of this year so we can take students next year,” Chigwagwa said.

He highlighted the need for a new school, noting that Rutendo currently has only one secondary school serving students from four primary schools.

“The existing secondary school in Rutendo is no longer adequate to take all the children, so we end up having children forced to travel 7km to access secondary education in Torwood. That’s why we decided to build a school to limit the distance the children travel,” he said.

Chigwagwa also pointed out that some children fail to proceed to Form 1 due to the long distances they must travel.

“We have instances where children fail to proceed to Form 1, so we said this is a priority area,” he said.