Monitor Publications, Rotarians partner to promote reading, restock libraries

The Rotary Club of Kampala West and Monitor Publications Limited, have launched a campaign to establish reading centres and restock school libraries across the country.

Speaking at the launch in Kampala yesterday, Ms Gift Anne Tryphine, the head of “Read a Book Project”, said their club, which is celebrating 50 years since inception, partnered with Monitor Publications to promote the reading culture across the country so that children do not just read to pass examinations but also to enjoy and understand things around them.

“We have identified 10 schools across the country which we are starting with and we are also establishing reading centres as open libraries in rural areas. When we approached Monitor Publications, they were ready to start,” she said.
Nakasero Primary School is the first beneficiary of the reading materials.

Other institutions which have partnered previously on similar projects include the European Union, which initiated Tesa and Luuka, a comic book reproduced in newsprint to protect and uphold children’s’ rights.

Others include World Vision, MTN, UNHCR, and Pepsi Cola Windle Trust, Masindi Child Development Federation, which have used Newspapers in Education to promote literacy across the country.

While receiving the donation, High Court judge Geoffery Kiryabwire welcomed the initiative, saying as Kitante Primary School, also his former school, celebrates its Golden Jubilee, he will ensure that it reclaims its former glory of having the best school library in the country.

“Those days, Kitante Primary School, Nakasero Primary School and Lake Victoria Primary School were the top three schools in the country with the best libraries. I will talk to my President to see what we can do for school,” he said, adding that because of such a good foundation the school produced two prominent city businessmen Patrick Bitature and Charles Mbire.

Mr Sam Ntesibe, the sales supervisor of Monitor Publications, who represented Mr Tony Glencross, the managing director of NMG-Uganda, said Monitor Publications will provide the school with newspapers from Monday to Wednesday when it produces magazines targeting children.

Some of these include Rainbow for lower school, Newspapers in Education to promote literacy on Mondays as well as Pass PLE which comes out every Wednesday to provide access to examination materials for children in rural areas, for schools which cannot afford national examinations questions, for them to revise.

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