by Kristen Ku
ST. MATTHEW’S, Cayo District, Mon. Mar. 20, 2023
An early morning fire over the weekend gutted several classrooms at St. Matthew’s Government School in St. Matthew’s Village, Cayo District. Reports are that around 5 a.m., officials were informed of a fire at the school, but by the time they arrived on the scene the fire had already destroyed 5 classrooms in the school’s main building.
Principal of the school, Shakira Berry, who lives in Georgeville, told local reporters that sometime around 6 a.m. she received the call that the school was on fire, and when she got to the school the fire had already been put out. Berry said all she met was the remains of the building that once housed 196 students. Five classrooms were burnt and two suffered water damage.
The fire department has not yet confirmed the cause of the fire, but it is believed that the school suffered from electrical problems. “I don’t know how the fire started because I haven’t gotten anything yet from the fire department, anything official from the fire department, so I don’t have any clue how it started,” Berry said. “I know at St. Matthew’s Government School we had an electrical problem. I said ‘had’ because it’s no longer there.”
“It’s a step back, but that doesn’t mean that we stop. We use this opportunity to move forward because the students are counting on us, the community is behind us, we have the support of the ministry so we know that this is just a hurdle that we will have to move forward from,” Berry said.
The Ministry of Education (MoE) sent out a press release today recounting that the Minister of Education, Hon. Francis Fonseca; Minister of Infrastructure Development and Housing, Hon. Julius Espat; Minister of Sustainable Development, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management, Hon. Orlando Habet; the Chief Executive Officer in the MoECST, Dian Maheia; and the Chief Education Officer, Yolanda Gongora, all visited the school.
The Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Infrastructure Development and Housing, in partnership with others, have proposed to work closely with the school, to do what they can to ensure the quick and safe return of both the staff and students. The value of the loss the school suffered is still undetermined.
It’s an especially hard blow, school having been out for over a year because of the pandemic. Berry said their focus is on cleaning up the compound and continuing to work with students via paper-based teaching before moving forward. Berry said they welcome any help from the public, and the school can be contacted at 610-9234.