Phalombe District Council is facing serious transportation and funding challenges, a development which has suffocated operations in the education sector.

District Education Manager for Phalombe, Hendrix Likeke told YFM Online that his office which looks after nine zones, is operating with one vehicle and low funding.

A recent visit to the district’s education office by YFM, revealed that the office is relying on a single vehicle, an old Toyota Prado registration number ZA 8560, which has already covered 600, 000 kilometers and most of the times it spends time at garages for service.

Likeke said the district is allocated K15 million per year through the national budget which is far too low.

“We are failing to conduct monitoring work in our schools effectively because a single vehicle is not enough to cater for all the operations and out of the K15 million which we receive to run the office, K5 million is used for the vehicle maintenances.”

He therefore pleaded with the authorities to urgently address the matter to ensure that the education sector continues to shine in the district.

In the just released 2019 Primary School Leaving Certificate of Education (PSLCE) examination results Phalombe district has emerged as the best among all the districts.

Likeke attributed the success the district has registered to hardworking spirit and collaboration among the teachers in the district.

According to the ministry of Education, Science and Technology in conjunction with the Malawi National Examinations Board (MANEB), out of 282, 428 candidates who sat for the 2018/19 PSLCE, 218, 756 have passed representing 77.15% pass rate.