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2 million children out of school in Angola

Wednesday April 18 2018
angop

Lack of teachers, especially due to natural attrition, has forced many schools in Angola to close down. PHOTO | ANGOP

By ARNALDO VIEIRA

About 2 million children are not attending school in Angola, the Education ministry says.

Education minister Cândida Teixeira said the figure could be much higher if all the data was available.

Ms Teixeira, who addressed a press conference after a two-day visit to Zaire Province, about 481km north of the capital Luanda, blamed the situation on lack of teachers and infrastructure.

Lack of teachers, especially due to natural attrition, has forced many schools to close down, she said.

In Bié Province, for instance, about 11,000 children in Nharea municipality were not attending school this year for lack of teachers, according to the Education officer, Mr Camilo Ngueve.

The province that lies on the Bié Plateau in the central part, about 685km south of Luanda, was hard hit by the Angolan civil war and was only still struggling to recover.

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Ms Teixeira disclosed that the government would hire 20,000 teachers in the next two months, against a shortage of 50,000.

Angola currently has 177,000 teachers, but has frozen new recruitment for more than three years.

The Angolan teachers only resumed work on Monday, after suspending a three-week old strike.

The strike was seen as President João Lourenço’s first major labour challenge since he came to power last September.

President Lourenço took over from José Eduardo dos Santos, following an election, marking the end of a 38-year reign.

Teachers in Angola have since 2013 been clamouring for better pay and improved work conditions.

Their salaries were last raised in 2012.

Angolan teachers’ salaries range between $225 to $1,378 (about Kwanzas 49,000 to 300,000) per month.

The southern Africa state's adult literacy rate stood at 66.03 per cent in 2014, according to Unesco.

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