By JAMES APA GUMUNO
About 200 teachers from other parts of the country are stranded in the Western Highlands province and cannot go home for the Christmas holidays.
The angry teachers said it was now two weeks into their festive season holiday and no action was being taken by the education authority in the province to provide them with their leave fares to travel home.
Manson Donode from Oro province teaching at Kindeng primary school in the South Waghi district said his application for leave fares were lodged with the education division in April this year.
Mr Donode, speaking on behalf of other teachers, said leave fares were their entitlement and must be made available before the Christmas holiday starts so that they could travel home straight after the school year closed.
Mr Donode said teachers wanted to spend their holidays with families and relatives back in their province of origin and not in the Western Highlands province.
He said that he had three family members which includes his wife and two children under the age of 18, and had requested for K7,900 worth of plane tickets for the family to travel to Oro.
Mr Donode claimed that education division in the province told them that the province was given K800,000 for the teachers’ leave fares. Where the money had gone no one knows.
Attempts to speak with assistance Education Secretary Hans Gima in the province yesterday were unsuccessful.