Museveni Calls For Sex Education

By Allan Turyaguma PRESIDENT Yoweri Museveni has said he will formally write to the Ministry of Education officials instructing them to implement the teaching of sex education in schools.Museveni said this would help in prompting the declining trend of the spread of HIV/AIDS in Uganda.“I want to write to them formally to ensure that every fortnight, headmasters or headmistresses gather all the pupils and teach them how AIDS is spread and how it can be prevented,” Museveni said.He was on Saturday addressing a congregation at Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST), where he awarded degrees and diplomas to 143 graduands.A total of 53 graduands qualified for bachelor of medicine and surgery, while four got masters of science degrees. Museveni said the campaign which the Movement government launched against HIV/AIDS had seen the prevalence of the disease reduce from 30% in 1998 to the current 6%.“The children now are so many in schools and I am worried that if they don’t get enough information we shall get a setback in our war against AIDS,” he said.The Minister of Health, Brig. Jim Muhwezi, recently said the President had directed head teachers of primary schools to teach about HIV/AIDS after every two weeks.Museveni appealed to the graduands to always be good to the people they serve so that they learn all their problems and know how better to handle them.He said the university’s faculty of medicine would be expanded to accommodate all students seeking admission who qualify to do medicine.“We are going to build this medical school to admit the other 90%, this is not a problem at all. Dr. Kiddu Makubuya, the expansion shall take place,” he told the Minister of Education who was also present at the function.The, Vice-chancellor Prof. Frederick Kayanja, had earlier said that out of all the students who qualify to do medicine at Mbarara University, only 10% get admitted because the facilities are limited.Ends