• claims a shortage of 4616 academic staff

The Federation of University Teachers’ Association (FUTA) yesterday(04) called for the Minister of Education Dr. Susil Premajayantha to take immediate actions to fill the numerous vacancies prevailing in the state universities, The Daily Morning learnt.

FUTA Spokesperson Senior Lecturer Charuadaththe Ilangasinghe told The Daily Morning that around 400-500 university teachers and lecturers have left universities from January to end of May this year. He explained that the number also includes teachers and lecturers who retired in May, this year (2023).

“The total number of university teachers needed for all the state universities in Sri Lanka is 11,293. Out of the said amount, there are only 6,677 teachers currently engaging in academic activities. Accordingly, there is a shortage of 4,616 university teachers in the university system. We presented these statistics to President Ranil Wickremasinghe last month,” he said.

Ilangasinghe said that the Minister of Education had told them that the Ministry would take steps to fill these vacancies created with the retirement of university teachers in this year as soon as possible. However, according to him, filling only those vacancies created by retirement would not be sufficient, as it would not address the numbers of academics who have resigned, he opined.

“As per our estimation, 400-500 university teachers have left universities since January this year. Only 15% of teachers are retired. So it is a very small amount. Therefore we told the Education Minister to take actions to fill all the vacancies created in this year. But we received no clear response for his end “ he said.

Attempts to contact Minister of Education Dr. Susil Premajayantha about the shortage of academics, failed.