Malawi’s Minister of Education, Agnes NyaLonje, says she is impressed with the progress of construction project of Mchinji Teacher Training College (TTC).
NyaLonje was speaking this on Saturday 2nd April when she visited the construction site along with Director General of OPEC Fund for International Development, Dr. Abulhamid Alkhalifa.
She said upon looking at the pace of the project, she is so hopeful that the TTC will be completed by August and that it will enroll the first cohort in the next academic year which starts in September.
Minister Nyalonje further explained that the project is an expression of how committed the Tonse government led by Dr Lazarus Chakwera is in responding to the growing demand for access to quality education in the country.
“The impression is very positive because it is very close to completion and it has the capacity to take 600 trainee teachers. Our aim as government is to institute compulsory basic education and we should continue producing teachers of good quality.
“Overall, this infrastructure is near completion and by September we hope to begin enroll the first cohort of this college and this means we will be adding to the count of teachers after two years because it takes two years to train primary school teachers,” said NyaLonje.
She further added that the development will reduce the disparities on teachers attending to more pupils than the required 1:60 ratio as more teachers will be recruited to primary schools across the country.
On his part, Director General of OPEC Fund for International Development, Dr Alkhalifa, said his organization is so much committed to continue financing Malawi government to execute more interventions in education industry.
“We thank the government for the leadership and OPEC fund is always available for Malawi government and its people and we will be there to extend our support,” said Dr Alkhalifa.
Apart from Mchinji TTC, construction of Rumphi and Chikwawa TTCs is underway and at an advanced stage and overall the projects will cost US$42 million (K33 billion), including cost of supervision, and procurement of education equipment and furniture.
