Call for govt to address housing issues

THE Government needs to look seriously into the issue of teacher housing, PNG Teachers’ Association general secretary Ugwailubu Mowana says.
He told The National that a number of government schools in the city lacked teachers’ houses and that many of their teachers usually lived in their classrooms when students finished in the afternoon.
“Most of those schools have their teachers using their classrooms as their accommodation because they do not have houses to reside in,” Mowana said.
He said accommodation was not a condition of employment in the teaching service.
“But the Government in all countries, including in this government of the country, must know that housing or shelter is among the four important basic needs of human lives,” he said.
Mowana said that “when we talk about teachers, their accommodation cannot be conditional.
“It has to be provided because their nature of work depends on their homes.
“If they are living in the settlements then the preparation for teaching and learning would not be that effective for their students in class.”
Mowana said the Government should be encouraged to give priorities to teacher housings as much as possible, not because it was a basic human need but it was dictated by the nature of teachers’ work.
“They need housing and space to prepare work in the night and teach the next day,” he said.
“By dictation of their nature of teachers’ work, I would encourage the government to find every possible way to assist the teachers, not only in NCD, to ensure that their housing is guaranteed.”