The United Nations Children's Fund UNICEF and the NGO INTERSOS are working collectively to tackle the lack of educational materials reported by students to improve the teaching standard at the UNMISS Protection of Civilian site in Malakal. Some exercise and text books have been distributed, with many more to follow.

Lack of primary school materials has become a major concern for school children in UNMISS’s Protection of Civilians site in Malakal. The schoolboys in the PoC site expressed their disappointment over the lack of school supplies such as exercise books, text books, pens and pencils.

Pupils have therefore urged UNICEF and INTERSOS to intervene.

“They distributed a limited number of text books to us, but the books only covered two out of my five subjects subjects which are five and I got only two text books’’,  said Sarah William, a student at the sector one school.

After the alerts from students, UNICEF has affirmed its readiness to supply the schools with educational materials.

“The good news I want to tell you is that we have just received additional exercise books and text books, also for the education of younger children”, said Dr. Samuel Patti, Acting Head of the UNICEF office in Malakal and added:

“We are releasing them through partners like INTERSOS so that they can be distributed in the functional schools in the POC, and before the end of this month, I assure you that all the children that got no exercise books will have the books so that they start learning like any other children in the country”.

At the moment, five basic schools are operational in the Malakal PoC site.