Progressives Leaders Association opens Igbo language school in South Africa

NDIGBO children in South Africa can now be taught in Igbo language after the Progressives Leaders Association (Pila) decided to open a school in the country and has already enrolled 16 pupils in its first intake.

Pila is an organisation which sponsors an Igbo language school in the US and now is expanding its base. Chima Umealo, the coordinator of Pila in South Africa, said the group’s aim was to secure the Igbo language and ensure it would not be extinct.

Mr Umealo said: “Pila’s aim is to secure the Igbo language because Unesco had predicted that the language was among those that will go out of fashion in no distant time. We decided to come out with a programme to secure our language because a people without a language are no people.”

Also the president of Abia Union, South Africa, Mr Umealo said one way of sustaining Igbo culture was to secure the language. He added that children born in South Africa, who are not opportune to communicate with others when they go home would be taught the language.

“We therefore, resolved to establish an Igbo school in South Africa to affiliate with the one in the US to promote our culture and language. “As time goes on, we will teach them mathematics and science in Igbo to make them put to practice what they do daily in school and at home," Mr Umealo said.

He added that the children were taught during vacation, while arrangements had been concluded to teach them at weekends during school session. Eze Sidney Ihediwa, the traditional head of Abia indigenes in South Africa, said the establishment of the school was a step in the right direction.

Eze Ihediwa added that some children born abroad were losing touch with their language, noting that such schools would assist them to preserve their culture. Chief Ikechi Otuonye, the chairman of Ikwuano/Umuahia Community in South Africa, said the school would make children to speak their native language while abroad.