A seven-year-old girl was crushed to death after a unstable school roof collapsed, the state-run ISNA news agency reported on October 8.
“Donya Veisi,” an elementary schoolgirl died under the weight of the falling debris of the class of a school in Garmash village in Sanandaj, western Iran.
The youngster was taken to hospital but was pronounced dead shortly after.
Rashid Ghorbani, general director of the Department of Education in Kurdistan Province, announced that Donya Veisi, a first grade student of the elementary school of Garmash village, had been severely injured on Monday, October 8, 2018, when an old wall in the school yard collapsed.
Donya Veisi was immediately taken to the Be’ssat Hospital of Sanandaj, by her father, teacher and the school principal, but lost her life to serious injuries.
Ghorbani said the school had 13 students of different levels who studied in the same class. He had reported several times on the worn-out infrastructure of the school without Education Ministry officials heeding his warnings. Consequently, the collapse of the school wall took the life of a girl student, Ghorbani said.
Ghorbani claimed the education authorities had warned about the poor conditions of schools in the province but the officials neglected.
Being in a critical, unusable state, significant number of schools in Iran lack standard requirements.
After devastating November earthquake in Kermanshah Province, the minister of education, announced that one-third of the schools in Iran are not safe. Mohammad Bathaie considered the credits that were attributed each year in the budget bill for school rehabilitation as inadequate.
An MP also admitted that “50% of school buildings in Tehran are worn-out.” This is while the government of Hassan Rouhani has reduced the development share of education in the 2018 budget.
Farideh Olad Ghobad in an interview with the parliament’s news agency, Khaneh Mellat, on Sunday, January 21, said: considering that 50 percent of the schools in this city were worn out, this issue would have “financial and life threatening” consequences.
The state-run media have also frequently warned about the conditions of worn-out schools across Iran, which endanger the students’ lives.
“… Poor conditions of schools in Minab (northwest Iran)… reconstruction of such buildings are neglected each year, leading to roofs falling. This endangers the students’ lives and badly influences their learning.” (state-run Mehr news agency – March 28, 2017)
“Education under falling roofs… an earthquake less powerful than even 5 on the Richter scale will cause vast damages for Iran’s non-standard schools.” (state-run Mehr news agency – September 19, 2017)
“Most of the schools of Tehran’s 13th educational districted are very worn out,” according to the region’s education director. (state-run Rokna website – July 12th, 2017)
“The schools of east Hormozgan (southern Iran) are in critical condition… The roofs of two schools caved in last year… A catastrophe is in the making if special support is not provided,” according to Zolqadr, a member of parliament. (state-run Mehr news agency – July 23, 2017)
