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Transcript/Script((PLAYBOOK SLUG: ETHIOPIA TIGRAY WAR SCHOOLS (TV)
HEADLINE: UN Says Tigray War Costing 1 Million Children a Third Year of School
TEASER: Students in Amhara are traumatized by civil war, as nonprofits say lack of education in Tigray will have decades long impact
PUBLISHED AT: 5/16/2022 8:45am
BYLINE: Henry Wilkins
DATELINE: GASHENA, ETHIOPIA
VIDEOGRAPHER: Henry Wilkins
VIDEO EDITOR:
PRODUCER:
SCRIPT EDITORS: Salem Solomon, Steve Hirsch
VIDEO SOURCE (S): VOA, ZOOM
PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV X RADIO__
TRT: 3:05
VID APPROVED BY: MAS
TYPE: TVPKG
EDITOR NOTES:))
((INTRO)) [[The United Nations says Ethiopia’s war on Tigray region means more than 1 million children are entering their third school year without education. In neighboring regions, schools are reopening as fighters and displaced people that occupied them leave, but some face grim challenges, and their students, trauma. Henry Wilkins reports from Gashena, Ethiopia.]]
((NARRATOR))
A total of 1.39 million children in the Tigray region are currently missing out on education due to Ethiopia’s civil war, according to the United Nations. While journalists are banned from entering Tigray, in neighboring Amhara region, schools are beginning to reopen after much of the region was occupied by Tigrayan forces until December.
But the conflict still haunts them.
((NARRATOR))
((Henry Wilkins for VOA News (in English, 15secs)))
At Gashena Prep School, the TPLF used the classrooms as a base. They filled a mass grave with bodies, which have now been exhumed. They left graffiti on the classroom walls insulting the Amhara ethnic group and the prime minister.
((NARRATION))
The Tigray People's Liberation Front has denied such accusations and called for an independent investigation.
Here is some of the graffiti written in the school library and the classroom.
One of the students recounts returning to the school after the Tigrayan forces had left.
((Ayten Mune, Student (in Amharic, 21 secs)))
“When I returned, there were bloodstains, broken desks, broken computers here and there. The TPLF had used the school as a hospital, which is why there was so much blood.”
((NARRATOR))
The deputy headmaster of the school said he had to mobilize the local authorities to exhume from a mass grave the bodies of soldiers and civilians killed during the fighting, because of the psychological impact it had on students.
(Getnet Habtamu, Gashena Preparatory School Deputy Headmaster (in Amharic, 23 secs)) )
“They refused to attend school, because the compound was a total mess, with blood here and there. We worked with the community to bring them back. All the teachers went door to door to persuade students to return,”
((NARRATOR))
Further north, near the town of Sekota, the U.N. provides schooling for children displaced by the conflict, but many of them are also traumatized from witnessing the fighting.
((Bertukan Gebrat, Displaced Student (in Amharic, 27 secs)))
“My brother died in an explosion while he was playing with his friend. I have seen many, many bad things. I even saw people killed after having their limbs cut off.”
((NARRATOR))
The director of Education Cannot Wait, a U.N.-funded nonprofit, says education can play an essential part in helping children like Bertukan and Ayten
build resilience to trauma.
((Yasmine Sherif, Education Cannot Wait Director (in English, 32 secs))) ((Mandatory Courtesy: Zoom))
“You see family members, parents, siblings raped, killed, injured, and a child, during the formative years, sees all this violence or even are the subject of this violence, will logically become traumatized, and that’s why mental health and psychosocial services are another very existential, lifesaving component of education.”
((NARRATOR))
She adds, while food security and access to water are essential to people displaced by war, education is also essential in the long term if countries are to build back effectively and avoid future conflict.
For the 1.39 million students entering their third year of missed school in Tigray, the consequences will likely be felt for the rest of their lives.
((Henry Wilkins, for VOA News, Gashena, Ethiopia))
NewsML Media TopicsArts, Culture, Entertainment and Media
NetworkVOA
Location (dateline)GASHENA, ETHIOPIA
BylineHenry Wilkins
Brand / Language ServiceVoice of America - English
