Don’t let teachers bring guns to school in KP... Please!
On Thursday June 11, a teacher was cleaning his gun in Mingora when he accidentally shot a student of class five.
It would appear that the province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) is still waiting for its ‘change’ or tabdeeli. Many Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) supporters argue that things have changed and we all hope they are right.
But the one thing they might want to ask their leader to look into is the alarming incidents of gun violence in academic institutions. A study conducted done in 2006 revealed that 77% of the homicidal deaths in K-P were a result of gun related incidents/gunshot wounds.
Maybe no one in the K-P government knew or understood just how violence can erupt or hadn’t read that study when they decided to provide guns/ammunition to the teachers in K-P as a ‘self-defence’ measure. The answer to violence, according to them it seems, was more violence. The answer to security threats was arming everyone with guns and turning the province’s schools into militias.
Sure enough, on Thursday June 11, 2015, a teacher was cleaning his gun in Mingora (which begs the question why his gun was being cleaned in class; while delivering the guns/arms training to teachers, were these teachers not taught the proper and safe use of firearms?), when he accidentally shot a student of class five.
The little boy died on the spot.
It’s disturbingly ironic that it is the children, again, that are under threat after the Peshawar attack. In October 2014, groups clashed at the University of Agriculture, Peshawar and a student died as a result of exchange of fire. Brawls and clashes take place at all universities, but providing teachers with ammunition is insipid to say the least.
The world is actually light years ahead of us; they are actually lobbying for gun control. The gun-related deaths that occur in the United States have raised serious alarm amongst human rights groups and an active movement against the gun lobby is underway. However, Pakistan has found the novel solution of finding peace by giving teachers no less than guns.
While there are many solutions to the security problem in K-P, giving teachers guns isn’t one of them. Accidental gunshots are only one of the many serious repercussions that follow with gun/firearm proliferation, as we have seen.
The K-P government must immediately discourage teachers to use/bring firearms into schools and academic institutions so as to prevent these incidents from occurring. It is already a shame that local government polls in K-P have been strung with gun-related violence and deaths. It is a mystery to me why the provincial government there would not act upon or immediately revoke anyone’s arms in any place other than a shooting range or a hunting ground.
But the one thing they might want to ask their leader to look into is the alarming incidents of gun violence in academic institutions. A study conducted done in 2006 revealed that 77% of the homicidal deaths in K-P were a result of gun related incidents/gunshot wounds.
Maybe no one in the K-P government knew or understood just how violence can erupt or hadn’t read that study when they decided to provide guns/ammunition to the teachers in K-P as a ‘self-defence’ measure. The answer to violence, according to them it seems, was more violence. The answer to security threats was arming everyone with guns and turning the province’s schools into militias.
Sure enough, on Thursday June 11, 2015, a teacher was cleaning his gun in Mingora (which begs the question why his gun was being cleaned in class; while delivering the guns/arms training to teachers, were these teachers not taught the proper and safe use of firearms?), when he accidentally shot a student of class five.
The little boy died on the spot.
It’s disturbingly ironic that it is the children, again, that are under threat after the Peshawar attack. In October 2014, groups clashed at the University of Agriculture, Peshawar and a student died as a result of exchange of fire. Brawls and clashes take place at all universities, but providing teachers with ammunition is insipid to say the least.
The world is actually light years ahead of us; they are actually lobbying for gun control. The gun-related deaths that occur in the United States have raised serious alarm amongst human rights groups and an active movement against the gun lobby is underway. However, Pakistan has found the novel solution of finding peace by giving teachers no less than guns.
While there are many solutions to the security problem in K-P, giving teachers guns isn’t one of them. Accidental gunshots are only one of the many serious repercussions that follow with gun/firearm proliferation, as we have seen.
The K-P government must immediately discourage teachers to use/bring firearms into schools and academic institutions so as to prevent these incidents from occurring. It is already a shame that local government polls in K-P have been strung with gun-related violence and deaths. It is a mystery to me why the provincial government there would not act upon or immediately revoke anyone’s arms in any place other than a shooting range or a hunting ground.