Mozambique: Nyusi urges teachers to remain patriots – Watch

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Mozambique: Nyusi urges teachers to remain patriots – Watch

3:08 CAT | 29 May 2018

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi on Sunday appealed to the patriotism and integrity of the country’s teachers for the training of conscious citizens who are committed to development.

He made this appeal in Meconta district, in the northern province of Nampula, during a meeting with 330 teachers and other education workers on the penultimate day of a four day working visit to the province.

“I want to ask you to continue being patriots”, he said. “Teachers must be Mozambicans so that they can train patriots and not people who rebel against their own motherland”.

Nyusi urged the teachers to set examples of seriousness and integrity, which would earn them respect. He called on them “to study permanently to improve your own knowledge. Don’t remain stagnant”.

He insisted that teachers should distance themselves from corruption in the schools, and thus avoid training citizens who come to regard corruption as something normal.

Among the factors that could improve the quality of Mozambican education, Nyusi listed avoiding teacher absenteeism, conserving school materials and infrastructures, fighting corruption, particularly bribes to enrol or pass students, and fake diplomas. “Only in this way will you be able to earn the respect of society”, he told his audience.

A message read by the Nampula Provincial Secretary of the National Union of Teachers (ONP). Andre Jana, told Nyusi that teachers in the province are still not being paid for overtime, and there are still no promotions or progression along the career structure.

Overcrowded classrooms, lack of libraries and laboratories, a housing shortage, and the lack of banks where they can deposit their savings were among the other problems teachers face in the district.

Answering these concerns, Nyusi said that Mozambique’s situation today is better than it was when he took office in January 2015. “Exports declined, and consequently so did state revenue”, he said. “We had disasters – floods in the centre and north, and drought in the south. Our currency depreciated”.

Above all, the stare of his term of office was characterised by an environment of politico-military instability. “Don’t forget that we were in a period of war, and so the economy was paralysed”, Nyusi said. “Money wasn’t circulating and nor was merchandise, and when they don’t circulate no project can advance, because investments also don’t appear”.

Donors stopped providing direct support to the Mozambican state budget, he added, insisting that the way forward was to increase production.

“Imports of food have declined”, said Nyusi. “The consumption of national goods helps the country. A further measure has been reforming the public companies, because these must produce, in order to allow the distribution of wealth”.

Also on Sunday Nyusi inaugurated a system of electronic scanners at the rail station in the town of Namialo, in Meconta.

The new equipment, operated by the Mozambican Tax Authority (AT) can check goods carried on the northern rail corridor that runs from the port of Nacala to the Malawian border. The verification is done by the scanners, without any direct human intervention.