About 100 women who had protested massive increases in school fees were being held by police on Friday, police and organisers of the protest said.
The protesters were arrested in the second city of Bulawayo where they marched eight blocks to government education offices on Thursday to demand the lowering of school fees.
The organisers, a militant women’s group known as Women of Zimbabwe Arise (Woza), said 73 schoolchildren were briefly detained before being released to lawyers and parents. Many of the children, aged between seven and 18, wore school uniforms.
”This may have been the last time the children will be able to wear uniform as they may not return to school next week,” the women’s group said in a statement.
Zimbabwe schools reopen on Tuesday after the Easter break. Fees at most state schools have more than doubled for the new term after the government last week nearly trebled the salaries of teachers,
police and soldiers.
Children are not admitted to class if fees have not been paid in advance.
Earlier this week, education authorities said fees were being hiked to help meet soaring costs, including teachers salaries, as the nation faces rampant inflation, officially at 913% the
highest in the world.
Some junior day schools doubled their charges to about Z$5-million ($50) while new charges at state boarding schools ranged between Z$20-million and Z$100-million ($200 and $1 000) a term.
Smaller increases in the past year have led to a jump in absenteeism and some families have admitted keeping girls at home to help with household chores and sending only boys to school.
The government faces mounting discontent over economic hardships. The main opposition Movement for Democratic Change has called for mass street protests against President Robert Mugabe’s authoritarian rule — and police and security officials were among those recently granted raises.
Woza has repeatedly defied a ban on public demonstrations under the nation’s sweeping security laws.
Scores of women were detained after staging a Valentine’s Day protest on February 14 in which they distributed red roses and called for an easing of the harsh security laws. Others have been arrested for banging empty cooking pots to protest food shortages. — Sapa-AP