Thousands of children in the eastern Nangarhar province are taught in two shifts, out in the open, in all weather conditions, more than 460 schools remain without buildings for years.
The province has more than 900 schools where more than one million students are enrolled. Officials said efforts are underway to build more schools this year.
Lack of school building has been a major problem raised by schoolteachers and residents from across the country.
President Ghani vowed on March 25 that he at least 6,000 school buildings will be held within the next two years, but this time, he said basic steps have been taken to achieve the goal.
Statistics by the Ministry of Education show that almost 300 schools are without buildings in Kabul.
Ghani said work on the construction of 1,200 school buildings will start next week and budget for construction of 2,700 schools has been allocated this year.
The Education Minister Mirwais Balkhi late in March said they hope that they will resolve the lack of school buildings by 90 percent within a year.
Even in the Jalalabad city, the capital city of Nangarhar, many schools have no buildings and facilities, residents said.
“Studying under these tents is difficult,” said Tawhid, a school student in Nangarhar. “The weather is warm sometimes and sometimes it is raining.”
“When the tents are damaged in the rain, we are off for two or three days,” said Mirwais, a student.
Another student, Tayeba, said their schools also lack toilets and drinking water.
“We cannot sit under the tents when it rains. These problems should be solved,” she said.
Some teachers from Base-e-Ekmalati school in Jalalabad city said they sent their complaints to the provincial education directorate many times but “it was not heard”.
“The is no required facilities in our school,” said Obaidullah Folad, principal of the school.
Officials from Nangarhar Education Directorate said 200 school buildings will be built this year.
“Based on President Ghani’s order, 2,000 school buildings will be built across Afghanistan this year and fortunately, among them, 208 school buildings will be built in Nangarhar and work on the construction of the buildings has started,” said Asif Shinwari, a spokesman for provincial Education Directorate.
Statistics by the Ministry of Education show that 3.5 million children are deprived of education and at least 900 schools have remained closed across the country.
