Why Zimbabwe can't fill 15,000 teaching vacancies

Zimbabwe is unable to fill 15,000 teaching posts in government schools because school leavers are reluctant to join the profession.

The vacant posts are said to be increasing despite reports that thousands of Zimbabwean teachers, who had left the country at the height of the economic problems, were returning home.

An official in the Ministry of Education told the state owned Herald newspaper that out of the 111,000 teaching posts in the country, 96,000 were filled by qualified teachers.

Teacher training colleges, which were producing 5,000 teachers annually, were also failing to cope.

The authorities had given amnesty to teachers who had deserted their jobs to join the trek to countries such as South Africa and Botswana.

“The sector is in dire need of qualified teachers. The optimistic view that some teachers would come back has no relationship to reality, rendering the amnesty useless,” the deputy minister of Education, Mr Lazarus Dokora, told the Herald.

Perfect balance

“Brain drain has wreaked havoc in the sector. New graduates are leaving for foreign lands and others are joining other sectors.

“The number of graduates is too low compared to pupils starting school.

“We receive just above 5,000 teachers each year and with this trend continuing, a perfect balance will not be achievable.”

Zimbabwe’s teachers are still poorly paid compared to their counterparts in the region.

A qualified teacher earns less than $300 month and government says it does not have adequate resources to improve working conditions for its employees.

The brain drain is also likely to impact negatively on the quality country’s education system.

Zimbabwe currently has the highest literacy levels in Africa.