Mozambique has a shortage of 12,000 teachers for the 2025 school year – government

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Mozambique has a shortage of 12,000 teachers for the 2025 school year – government

2:36 CAT | 29 Jan 2025

FILE- For illustration purposes only. [File photo: AIM]

The Mozambican government admitted on Tuesday that it faced a shortage of around 12,000 teachers for the 2025 school year, acknowledging that some education professionals will have to work overtime to meet the needs.

“We have a shortage of around 12,000 teachers, and this poses a major challenge,” said cabinet spokesperson and Minister of State Administration and Civil Service Inocêncio Impissa after their meeting in Maputo.

Impissa said that, on average, around one million new entrants are admitted to the national system for primary and secondary education and acknowledged that hiring new teachers would not make up for the deficit across the country.

“In addition to hiring new teachers, which may not be the same number [around 12,000] this year, there will be a need to overload some teachers, and that is why we have the problem of overtime, which is to cover the deficit we have in teachers,” Impissa explained.

The government spokesperson assured that the conditions have been created for the start of the 2025 school year, despite the challenges related to insufficient infrastructure, with classrooms destroyed during post-election demonstrations and others by cyclones Chido and Dikeledi, which mainly affected the northern region of Mozambique.

Data from the National Institute for Disaster Risk Management (INGD) up to 18 January indicate that 129 schools were affected by the passage of Cyclone Dikeledi across the north of the country on the 13th of this month. Adversely impacted were 371 classrooms, and consequently 807 teachers, as well as 67 kilometres of roads, 115 damaged boats and 2,278 overturned medium voltage poles.

Mozambique is considered one of the countries most severely affected by climate change in the world, facing cyclical floods and tropical cyclones during the rainy season, which runs from October to April.

Since October 21, Mozambique has been experiencing a climate of social unrest, with protests and strikes called by former presidential candidate Venancio Mondlane. Violent clashes between the police and demonstrators have resulted in at least 315 deaths, including those of around two dozen minors, and around 750 people suffering gunshot wounds, according to the electoral platform Decide, a non-governmental organization which monitors electoral processes.

Source: Lusa