Lack of accommodation for teachers at Kamwanjili Primary School in Mambwe district is reported to have forced some teachers to start living in classrooms.
Speaking in an interview with journalists, Benda Banda who is a concerned parent in the area says that the lack of accommodation for teachers at the school has been a problem for a while.
She says that the decision by the school administration to turn the classroom into a house means that the over four hundred pupils at the school do not have enough classrooms for their lessons, leading to congestion in classrooms.
Ms. Banda says that the community has molded over twenty thousand bricks to help in building staff houses but lack of funds, as created challenges in procuring other building materials.
And commenting on the matter, Provincial Education Officer Allan Lingambe says that he will engage the District Education Board Secretary for Mambwe District to get details on the matter and find a solution.
He says that if there are no houses in the area where teachers can rent, then the Ministry of Education needs to sit down with the PTA, Parent Teachers Association and other stakeholders to come up with a way forward to sort out the problem.
He says most rural schools in the province have serious critical shortage of staff accommodation and PTAs have played a big role in ensuring that houses for teachers are built.