A secondary school for Buwatuwa

In March 2026 the buildings and their furniture were handed over to the school's Board of Governors. Karsten Wolpers, our chairman, and members of the Freundeskreis were there, together with parents, teachers and representatives of the church.

As a sign of thanks, the Anglican bishop gave a goat. As agreed, it will go to a widow and her children near Butiru.

At the heart of it is the block with four classrooms, furnished with desks. In the administration building, the head teacher, the school office and the teachers finally have enough weatherproof rooms – plus a library and a laboratory, which pupils and teachers explored straight away.

The hall isn't only for school assemblies. It is also the dining room and the exam room for the annual national exams of the secondary school and the primary school next door. A kitchen with a store is built onto the hall, with two energy-saving stoves: pupils and teachers now regularly get breakfast porridge and a good lunch.

There is also a latrine block with four toilets and an extra urinal for the boys.

From next year, up to 80 new pupils are expected every year. They come from the surrounding primary schools and have qualified for secondary school with their Primary Leaving Exam.

Most parents in this remote area are smallholders living from hand to mouth. They cannot afford fees for distant, expensive boarding schools. The fees in Buwatuwa are affordable and already include porridge and lunch – and they can be paid in instalments or even in kind.

As soon as the grant was confirmed, the school board, the church and the foremen from Butiru met in Buwatuwa, and work began. The old school building was pulled down.

For the walls, trenches about one metre deep were dug first, filled with stones, covered with concrete and built up to foundation level. The latrine pit got a concrete cover, and the walls went up on top of it.

By the end of January all three buildings – administration, classroom block and hall – had reached ring-beam height. By mid-February the ring beams and gables were finished and the roofers could start. Master mason Paul Wefafa from our team in Butiru led the work.

The road for the building materials runs through three valleys. On rainy days the lorry often had to be half unloaded and the rest fetched later – sometimes only pushing helped.

Sand, aggregate and bricks are bought from local suppliers. Many of them have no receipts of their own and sign with an initial or a fingerprint. Prices change with the seasons: bricks cost more in the rainy season, when drying and firing them is harder, while river sand costs more in the dry season, when the rivers wash up less.

On behalf of the school board, the church, the village community of Buwatuwa and the surrounding primary schools, we warmly thank the BINGO Environmental Foundation Lower Saxony and everyone who made this school possible. Young people who have finished primary school can now go on to secondary school – in weatherproof buildings, with a library and a laboratory.