IN a country already wading through deep economic hardship, the announcement by the Zimbabwe School Examinations Council (Zimsec) to hike examination fees by 100% has sent shockwaves across the nation.
The new fees — US$24 per Ordinary Level subject and US$48 per Advanced Level subject — appear not only steep, but insensitive to the prevailing socio-economic circumstances that most Zimbabwean families are enduring.
It is an unsettling decision at a time when the majority of citizens are grappling with poverty, diminishing incomes and an ever-rising cost of living that continues to push basic survival beyond the reach of ordinary households.
The decision itself, communicated through Finance Circular Number 2 of 2026 and signed by Zimsec director of Finance Z Muzenda, may seem administrative or procedural from a bureaucratic lens.
Yet, for the ordinary parent in rural Murehwa, Tsholotsho or Chiredzi, this circular represents a new wall between their child and the promise of education.
It is a decision that will have real and painful consequences for thousands of learners who aspire for better futures but whose parents can barely afford daily essentials, let alone extra costs imposed under the guise of cost recovery.
At an average of US$216 for a student taking nine O’ Level subjects, the new fees are effectively exclusionary. For many Zimbabwean families, this figure represents not only several months’ worth of income but also a cruel reminder that education, once heralded as the country’s most precious inheritance, is increasingly becoming a preserve of the privileged. Even for parents who try their best to support their children’s schooling — often scraping together fees through vending, piecework or remittances — the new requirement will prove a mountain too steep to climb. And in a country where the Primary and Secondary Education ministry has acknowledged that approximately 50 000 pupils drop out of school in 2024 due to poverty and other debilitating factors, Zimsec’s decision only deepens this crisis.
The timing of this increase could not be more unfortunate. Zimbabwe’s rural education infrastructure remains in a state of alarming decay.
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Classrooms with cracked walls, pupils learning under trees or sharing tattered books and teachers demoralised by poor remuneration — such images are not relics of the past but daily realities for countless schools across the country.
How, then, can a system that fails to guarantee the minimum conditions of learning demand more from those who have the least?
The average pass rate at Ordinary Level remains below 40%, signalling not only systemic challenges but also the enduring inequities of an education system that has yet to recover from years of under-investment and neglect. In this context, hiking exam fees is not only regressive but, frankly, unconscionable.
Education is not a privilege to be rationed out; it is a right guaranteed by the Constitution of Zimbabwe and enshrined in international instruments such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. When an institution like Zimsec raises fees without meaningful consultation, transparency or regard for social conditions, it effectively sidelines this constitutional promise. The very idea of meritocracy begins to crumble when access to education — and certification — becomes determined by a family’s wallet rather than a learner’s potential.
Zimsec has argued that the fee adjustments are necessary to “mobilise resources for the preparation of the June 2026 national examinations.”
Yet, one must question whether financial recovery should come at the expense of access. The essence of national education policy should be to expand opportunity, not to gate-keep it. A more thoughtful approach would have been to engage the Primary and Secondary Education ministry, the Finance ministry and the Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare ministry in developing a comprehensive rescue plan that balances institutional sustainability with social justice.
Such a plan could include more government subsidies for examination costs, especially for learners in public schools and rural areas. Education, after all, is a public good — and public goods require collective investment.
The government could introduce a targeted voucher or scholarship system funded through social protection mechanisms to ensure no child drops out of school merely because of failure to pay exam fees. At the same time, the Education ministry and Zimsec should establish a transparent review framework that ties future adjustments to clear indicators such as inflation, fiscal capacity, and household income levels — not arbitrary decisions made in isolation of reality.
Moreover, Zimsec must urgently re-examine its fiscal management and operational efficiency before transferring the burden to parents.
Are there administrative costs that can be trimmed? Can partnerships be forged with development agencies or private entities to fund key examination logistics?
Can digital solutions reduce printing and logistical expenses that often inflate operational budgets? These are the kinds of structural questions an accountable institution should be asking before passing costs to the suffering citizens.
The moral and social cost of this fee hike is immense. Every learner, who fails to register for exams because their family cannot afford the new rates, represents a dream deferred, a potential doctor, teacher, engineer or artist whom the system has excluded.
The cost is not only borne by individual families; it is a cost to the nation’s collective progress. When education becomes unaffordable, inequality widens and social cohesion erodes. A society that prices its young people out of education is a society writing its own obituary.
Zimsec and the Education ministry must, therefore, act swiftly and pragmatically.
Fee hikes cannot be the default solution to financial strain. Instead, policies must be guided by empathy, equity and the recognition that education remains the single most powerful weapon against poverty.
As Nelson Mandela once reminded us, “It is through education that the daughter of a peasant can become a doctor… that the child of a farm worker can become the president of a great nation.” That vision is now under threat.
In truth, the measure of leadership is not in making easy administrative decisions, but in making moral ones. The decision to double exam fees in the midst of rising poverty is not just an economic misstep — it is a moral failure.
If Zimbabwe truly believes in the promise of education for all, then Zimsec and the government must urgently rethink this policy, before the dreams of an entire generation are extinguished by the weight of a price tag.
