Hunger and desperation are driving pupils to suicide at a school near Mthatha in the Eastern Cape, the Dispatch Online reported on Monday.
Upper Corana High School principal Suthukazi Lujabe said that most pupils walk long distances on empty stomachs to get to school.
She said one or two pupils had killed themselves because of hunger every year from 2001 to 2006.
”Last year, there was one [pupil] who was [always] complaining about stomach cramps. When we asked, we discovered that the child did not get any food before coming to school.”
Mthunzi Mtshakaza, a member of the school’s learner representative council, cited a note left by a girl who committed suicide last year.
”She wrote that she was tired of going to bed hungry every day because she does not have parents, and she does not have a reason to live.”
The high suicide rate has been linked to that fact that more than a quarter of the pupils may be HIV/Aids orphans.
Lujabe said almost every classroom had at least one pupil who was an orphan.
Some of the pupils were heads of their homes, while others lived with relatives.
Last week, social development provincial minister Toko Xasa handed over food parcels and school uniforms to orphans, and R238 000 to the Upper Corana village to start a project to benefit the school and the village. — Sapa