By A Correspondent| Students that sat for their grade 7 examinations in 87 primary schools failed, the state media reports.

At least 87 schools mainly in the rural areas performed badly and the ministry is said to be investigating the root cause for that.

The newly appointed Primary and Secondary Education Minister Cain Mathema commented on the issue and said:

And as a ministry, we are in the process of finding out why they failed. We want to find out from headmasters, inspectors, district education officers, from everyone who is involved in the education of our children.

We can look for someone to blame but all of us, from Government, parents, school development committees (SDCs), Members of Parliament (MPs) and teachers, have a part to play.

We cannot expect our students to perform better when teachers are sharing houses, when the students are learning in mud-and-pole blocks. We have a collective responsibility to address these things.

In contrast to urban schools, the publication noted that there is a huge disparity between rural and urban schools performance when it comes to these exams.

-StateMedia