Dr. Kuyok Abuol Kuyok , the Undersecretary at the Ministry of General Education and Instruction - credit | Eye Radio/Lou Nelson | April 1, 2022

The Undersecretary of National Ministry of General Education and Instructions said 0nly 20% of the primary and secondary school teachers in South Sudan are professional teachers.

Kuyok Abol Kuyok said there are 64,000 teachers serving in both community and public schools across the country, out of which only 15,360 of them are qualified.

He also added that the ministry has started assessing the qualification of the teachers in order to improve the education sector in the country.

“We are talking about 64,000, [teachers] only 20 percent of them are qualified, 80 percent of them are not qualified,” Abol said.

“So, for example if you go to Northern Bahr el Ghazal, you got 9,000 teachers, only 2,000 of them have qualifications.”

Kuyok said the ministry is working to deliver quality education by improving teacher’s salaries to entice them back to the teaching profession.

“So, what the ministry is doing is to make sure that we have got the accurate the number of teachers, because remember, I said we have increased the pay for teachers, so you must pay the right teachers.”

Abol’s stake verdict came after the former Minister of General Education and Instruction, Deng Deng Hoc said in November 2022, that majority of the teaching workforce on government payroll is incapable to deliver and should be sent away.

Mr. Deng said the ministry is relying on less skilled personnel as the majority of teachers have not attained university degrees.

According to him, 24,694 government-employed teachers are either low-qualified or totally unqualified and must be replaced.

The Institute of Development Studies has found that teachers in South Sudan remain poorly and irregularly paid – leading to qualified teachers deserting for better-paying jobs.

This has resulted in schools hiring primary and secondary school leavers with limited proficiency in English – the language of instruction.

Teachers have also been complaining of low payment and poor working conditions.

In October 2023, a UN education agency (UNESCO) official called for joint support including a political will to promote and transform teachers’ status and living standard to reverse the teacher shortage in South Sudan.

Jasper Okodi, the UNESCO Country Representative in South Sudan stressed the need for diverse mobilization of communities, parents and politicians to support and help transform the teaching profession.