“Education Minister: We need to plan for the future”
THE Ministry of Education is undertaking a study of all schools in the country to determine the strength and stability of infrastructure of buildings and classrooms.
Education Minister Rosy Akbar made the comment while delivering her keynote address at the commissioning of the $3.2 million upgrade of Penang Sangam Primary and Penang Sangam High schools in Rakiraki last week.
“As we travel across the country and the various areas, we still have schools that need a lot of work to be done,” she said.
“So we are doing an infrastructure audit to see what schools need to be prioritised, what buildings need to go down and what new buildings need to be built.
“Obviously we need to plan for the future and we are doing that.”
Ms Akbar added that while the ministry appreciated the work done by faith and community-based organisations in establishing schools across the country — there were concerns that a lot of buildings may not be able to withstand Category 5 level storms.
“TC Winston has revealed to us that we have some very weak schools and maybe come the next cyclone, God-forbid we are struck by another Category 5, we may have buildings that could sustain damage.\
“What we have learnt from this rehabilitation exercise is that whether it is hospitals or school buildings, we need to build better, we need to have buildings that can withstand Category 5 or maybe
Category 6 cyclones.”
