That evening, dust rose beneath the parents' feet in the yard of Mwangaza School. Children waited for daladalas, teachers closed windows, and Baraka stood beneath a guava tree speaking to three parents. Amina arrived with the teachers' packet in her bag. She did not want to begin with a speech. First she needed to hear what had reached the community.
"Mama Amina, have you decided to return?" one parent asked before greeting her. "Baraka said you left the school."
The question crossed the yard like a stone. Neema stood by the gate, looking down. Amina took one step forward without turning toward Baraka.
"I came to renew the lease," she said. "I found that my name had been removed from the company register. I did not leave the school, and I have not come to take anyone's fees."
Baraka moved closer. "You are giving people half the story."
"Which complete story should we begin with?"
"You abandoned the daily timetable."
"The parents are asking about the lease, not the timetable."
A mother opened a message on her phone. "We were told the new company had already completed the renewal. Why are we hearing today that there is a problem?"
Amina asked to see the message without copying any parent's number. It had been sent from Baraka's account and said that the change had been made for "the sake of stability." It gave no meeting date and no membership details.
"People need stability, not a hundred questions," Baraka said.
"Stability built on a name erased without notice will break when the renewal is challenged."
A parent raised his voice. "We need to know whether children will continue studying here. Do not make us pay twice because of your quarrel."
Amina faced them all. "Children's fees will not be used as evidence in a family dispute. Payments will continue going to the school account, and operating updates will not name individual children."
Baraka laughed bitterly. "You hear her? She is creating an audit as if the school were a national office."
"It is a school whose people depend on the truth."
Amina took out the notice she had prepared with Musa. It announced a seven-day review limited to three matters: the lease, company membership, and teacher payments. It did not call Baraka a thief. It requested records.
"I ask parents not to circulate videos or children's names," she said. "Questions should be written on this notice and answered at the meeting."
Baraka pointed at her. "You do not understand the time we have. The investor is waiting."
"Has the investor already appeared in parents' conversations?"
A short silence fell. A parent holding a phone said, "Someone came yesterday asking about the number of classrooms. Baraka called him a consultant."
"His name?"
"Saidi, I think."
Baraka stepped forward. "This is not a place to question every visitor."
"That is why I will call a membership meeting where records can be read."
Amina handed one copy of the notice to a parent and pinned another to the board. As she wrote the date, a child asked whether the yard would be closed. Amina knelt before him.
"The yard remains yours. Adults are making a process to protect the school."
Baraka heard her. "Do not make the children see me as their enemy."
"That is why I will not use them as weapons."
A parent asked Amina privately about payments and the new account. She wrote the question into the notice without copying the child's name. A second parent asked whether fees would change. Amina answered that no fee would be changed without notice and an account summary.
Baraka followed her to the board. "By posting this, you make people think I hid everything."
"Why did you say the change was complete?"
"Because parents panic when they hear there is no certainty."
"False certainty is only delayed fear."
Neema came near the gate. Amina asked Baraka not to discuss the company in front of her. She did not want the child used as a witness merely because she was family.
The parents signed the notice one by one. They did not yet know who was right, but they now had a date, a source, and a place to ask. After they left, Amina received a short video of Baraka saying, *The new company is ready; the first founder left voluntarily.* She did not share it. She recorded its date and source, then put it in the packet.
The yard became quieter. Baraka watched the notice.
"You announced a war before the community," he said.
"I announced a review. The war began in the register."
The notice gave the parents a process instead of asking them to choose a family side immediately. The first parent signed beneath the notice and received a place to ask questions. # End of Chapter
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