Commissioners for Jur River and Raga counties of Western Bahr el Ghazal State are calling on education stakeholders and partners in South Sudan to build and renovate devastated secondary schools there.
According to the two officials, primary leaving students in both counties are forced to move to Wau County to further their studies. However, most families cannot afford to pay for education outside the counties.
Jur River county commissioner Nicola Theip Wol urged the state to build secondary schools in his county for students to access education within.
“Secondary schools are accumulated in Wau town and we don’t have in Jur River, the students do sit for the primary leaving exams and they come to Wau. They find accommodation very difficult in Wau and this is very difficult for them,” said Wol. “Am calling on the organizations to at least offer me three secondary schools in Jur River County so that the students sitting the exams study within the county.”
For his part, Salah Mameji Mamiri, the Commissioner of Raga County said the secondary schools in his county have been ravaged by the conflict and require renovation.
“For sure, schools in Raga need rehabilitation and support and also the issue of teachers as well as teaching syllabus. The secondary schools in Raga have been closed and students forced from the area due to conflict,” said Mameji.
The Director-General in the state education ministry Luciano Alberto Urayo said that of the three counties in the state, national secondary school examinations were only conducted in Wau County.
“This year, we have 20 secondary schools which are sitting the secondary school leaving certificate, all these schools are in Wau. The other counties are not included because of insecurity especially like Raga, Raga had insecurity before but now there is stability and they don’t have candidates for this year,” said Alberto.
He also pointed out that aside from the destroyed schools, Raga county also requires qualified teachers.
“We have teachers in Raga but most of them are Arabic pattern teachers so this is a very big problem and we are trying our level best to recruit new teachers especially the new graduates from the University of Bahr el Ghazal or Juba University,” he added.
The education official promised that the state education ministry is working to reopen secondary schools in Raga County soon.