Death of senior lecturer leaves a gap hard to fill

THE Catholic agency, the governing council board, management, staff and the students of the Holy Trinity Teachers’ College in Mt Hagen are mourning the death of one of their senior lecturers and former deputy principal Joe Deruage.
Classes have been suspended since yesterday while students and staff mourned the death.
Also classes at the Divine Word University matriculation centre and the Holy Trinity primary and elementary schools have been suspended.
Deruage served the college for nine years and was highly recognised and respected by his colleagues in the college.
He came from the Naraku tribe in Miunde, Kundiawa-Gembolg, Chimbu, and died in Port Moresby on Saturday afternoon from a long illness.
College principal Michael Miamel described Deruage’s death as a big loss.
He said that it was also a big loss to the Teachers’ Service Commission and the Teachers’ Education Division for he was a highly educated person.
Miamel said Deruage first lectured at the Madang Teachers’ College and then served Holy Trinity for nine years.
“With the contribution from late Joe I believe the nation has produced many educated population,” he said.
“He had been in the college for a very long time and we will miss him and the gap he left will be remembered for a very long time.”
Miamel said two staff members were sent to Port Moresby yesterday to talk with the Teachers’ Service Commission and the Teachers’ Education Division so that they could help get the body back to
Mt Hagen and then to Chimbu.
“We will need the assistance from the Teachers’ Service Commission and the Teachers’ Education Division to help the college to retrieve the body,” he said.
He said the college will help get Deruage’s body to his relatives.
Miamel said the college will be closed for a week. He said to lose such highly educated officers is also a great loss to the nation.
“One person makes a lot of differences and for staff it is a big loss,” Miamel said.