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B Mnguni

Nqobile Tshili, Chronicle Correspondent
BULAWAYO has requested about 200 more teachers from Government to fill vacant positions in the province’s schools.

Recently, Treasury gave the Civil Service Commission the go ahead to recruit 2 300 teachers countrywide.

Bulawayo’s acting Provincial Education Director Mrs Olicah Khaira said they have requested about 200 teachers.

“I don’t have the figures off hand but we’ve requested approximately 200 teachers. But we are aware that although we have our targets we may not get the teachers who may tally with our needs. You are aware that the Minister of Public Service said the ministry requested for 7 000 but will only hire 2 300.

This shows that there is a serious gap,” said Mrs Khaira.

Matabeleland South PED Mrs Tumisang Thabela said the province was targeting teachers for recruitment in specialised areas.  She could not immediately state the number of teachers the province had requested.

“We’ve requested teachers to teach early childhood development and others to cover new areas covered under the new education curriculum such as technical vocational areas and sciences,” said Mrs Thabela.

Matabeleland North PED Mrs Boitatelo Mnguni said the province has a serious gap for teaching staff to teach the new education curriculum. She also could not immediately give the number of teachers that they want recruited in the province.

“We need teachers to teach the new learning areas in the new curriculum. And we also reckon that colleges may not have produced the required teachers.

For example we’ve identified Heritage studies as one of the areas that might not have teachers so we have recommended history teachers to be oriented to the subjects. Another area of concern is ECD where we have the largest vacancies,” said Mrs Mnguni.— @nqotshili