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At the end of this week, Southern Sudan will become an independent nation. Citizens of the newest country in the world, the people of Southern Sudan face immense challenges and immediate threats.

They also stand before a unique opportunity to build a country that is free of war, respectful of human rights and prosperous. Education will play a pivotal role in the future stability and economic development of Southern Sudan.

more than 100,000 Sudanese civilians have been displaced due to recent clashes over the contested border district of Abyei. About half of them are children who are being exposed to hunger, violence and disease. They are often separated from their parents and out of school due to the conflict.

Rumbek — A one-month teacher training course organized by Save the Children in Rumbek, the capital of Lakes state in South Sudan, has been skipped by some of the teachers due to attend.

At the start of the workshop on Wednesday at Riak-Dor primary school, only 45 of the 60 teachers expected to attend arrived for the first day of the training. The teachers are drawn from Rumbek East and Rumbek Central counties.

Rumbek East county education director Abel Kook Thong threatened to withhold the February salaries of teachers who have not attended the training as a punishment. He said he was seeking permission to do so from the director general of Lakes state's education ministry.

He said the aim of the workshop is to "equip teachers with knowledge and skills" adding that the absent teachers are refusing to participate in efforts to fight against ignorance in the community. Kook encouraged the teachers attending the training saying teachers will play an important role in bringing development of South Sudan as a new nation.

In June South Sudan is expected to become independent after an overwhelming vote for secession in a referendum in January.

The United Nations Mission in Sudan is taking to the airwaves with a new radio drama series aimed at raising public awareness on various issues, including measures related to the ongoing process of implementing the peace accord that ended two decades of civil war in Africa’s largest country.

Radio drama is considered an effective way of promoting debate on sensitive social and political issues in a compelling way, while also reaching populations with low literacy rates and who have limited access to information because they live in remote areas.

Ikotos, South Sudan-a scenic region that belies its tragic past. For the past two decades the area has been ravaged by conflict, disease and deprivation. Basic services are scarce with education facilities suffering from a desperate lack of trained teachers and teaching resources.

Education is vital to the recovery of a region. Education will enable Ikotos' youth to escape a life of poverty and lead prosperous lives.

UNICEF has launched an initiative to get children back to school but there is a significant and unaddressed gap in teacher training. Education was near nonexistent during the civil war and has been slow to recover. Schooling mostly takes place in temporary shacks or under trees with limited or no teaching resources. Only 67 out of 353 primary school teachers in the Ikotos region received any training at all. Not only are most of the teachers untrained but some of have not completed even primary school education. Few have access to basic teaching materials. Without sufficiently trained teachers, increasing the rate of school attendance will be ineffective. With 11,809 pupils in Ikotos needing education, this is a desperate situation and a severe block to Ikotos's recovery.