A total of 469 prefabricated classrooms are used in public education, as reported on Thursday during a session of the Parliament’s Audit Committee, which examined on its own initiative two 2026 reports by the Audit Office, regarding the installation of prefabricated classrooms in schools and health and safety inspections at school facilities. Members of Parliament stated that there are political responsibilities for the current situation and criticized the Ministry of Education, noting the lack of a comprehensive plan.
The Committee’s Vice Chair and DIKO Member of Parliament, Chrysanthos Savvides, citing the Audit Office’s report, stated that there are 400 prefabricated classrooms in elementary and pre-elementary education and 69 in secondary education.
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AKEL Member of Parliament Nikos Kettiros argued that the Ministry of Education does not maintain up-to-date data on prefabricated classrooms in schools. He also noted that “schools are being built only in certain areas,” adding that “there are municipalities that have 5–6 schools.”
Mr. Kettiros said that “land in Dromolaxia has been expropriated for 25 years now, and they still haven’t made a decision to build a school.”
“The report lists all sorts of things,” noted AKEL MP Marina Nikolaou.
ELAM MP Polys Anogiriatis said that political responsibility lies with those who have governed over the years. “We want to know the timeline for replacing the prefabricated classrooms,” noted the ELAM MP.
Odysseas Michaelides, president of the “Alma” movement, stated that “the picture we see is a microcosm of our shattered state. The public service is in shambles.”
Michalis Vassiliou, spokesperson for the Audit Office, said that “since prefabricated classrooms are becoming permanent solutions, our position is that a zoning permit should be required.”
Deputy Director of Secondary General Education Giorgos Koutsidis noted that there are housing needs in all schools. He noted that “there is a registry for prefabricated classrooms; it’s just that the registry changes every year.”
According to Mr. Koutsidis, the three-year budget for the period 2027–2029 allocates €120 million for the construction of new school buildings and the expansion of existing ones.
A representative from the Urban Planning Department noted that urban planning approval is required even for prefabricated classrooms. He also said that no requests had been submitted to the Town Planning Department for approval to install prefabricated classrooms in schools.
The representative of the Electrical Services Department, Antonis Charalambous, reported that 492 schools had applied to the department for the issuance of certificates of suitability. As he explained, certificates were issued for 444 schools, while 42 are pending re-inspection, and six were deemed unsatisfactory.
During the construction phase of schools, building permits are not issued, said Christoforos Stylianou, a spokesperson for the Fire Department.
He said that the Ministry of Education is committed to ensuring children’s safety, despite the fact that there is a gap in the legislation. Specifically, Mr. Stylianou noted that 546 schools were requested for inspection over the past three years, of which 113 have fire safety certificates, while the rest have been cited with violations.
Representatives of parent associations for preschool, elementary, and secondary schools emphasized the need to provide children with everything they need; regarding prefabricated classrooms, they noted that this is a long-standing problem. At the same time, they demanded that all necessary measures be taken to ensure that all schools have fire safety and suitability certificates.
The Ministry of Finance has no particular involvement in how the Ministry of Education’s funds are allocated, the Ministry of Finance spokesperson clarified before the Audit Committee. She added that over the past ten years, there have been significant increases in the Ministry of Education’s budgets.
Concluding the discussion in the Committee, Chrysanthos Savvides referred to yet another complaint that had been brought to his attention. As he explained, at Kykkos High School in Paphos, the prefabricated classrooms were placed right on the edge of the school grounds, next to residential homes.
“The person who lives next door can’t open his bedroom window because the students will see him. The students wake him up every morning,” he noted.
“Is it possible for the School for the Deaf to have a prefabricated classroom? Do you know what happens to the brain of a baby wearing a hearing aid when it’s raining and he’s in that prefabricated classroom?”asked AKEL MP Christos Christofides.
“The number of prefab classrooms has gotten out of hand in the sense that it has multiplied in recent years. The first main reason is that there is overcrowding due to children with immigrant backgrounds, but also that pre-primary education has been expanded to include younger children,” said Mr. Chrysanthos Savvidis after the session concluded.
He noted that “over the past 30 years, successive governments have failed to plan ahead, resulting in us finding ourselves in a very problematic situation at this particular moment.”
Chaos with the prefab classrooms in schools: Some classrooms are right next to homes, others block playgrounds, and still others are positioned upside down, and so on
As Mr. Savvidis said, “Classrooms have been placed in a school playground, effectively eliminating the playground. Another classroom was placed facing the opposite direction from the school hallway, if that’s even possible.”
Regarding fire safety issues, the DIKO MP noted that “unfortunately, the law does not require fire safety certificates in public schools.”
At the same time, Mr. Savvides said that due to a shortage of school facilities, many children are forced to make other choices.
He cited technical education as an example. As he put it, “Because of the so-called point system, children are forced not to choose technical education—since they aren’t accepted there—and instead go on to general secondary education.”
“The current state of our schools’ physical and technical infrastructure is dismal,” Mr. Christofides stated after the session concluded.
He noted that there are significant shortages of space, which efforts are being made to address with so-called prefabricated classrooms.
He noted that “this situation did not just happen or fall from the sky. It is the result of political decisions made in recent years.”
As he said, “At the moment, the budget for technical services is slightly below the corresponding budget for 2010, while construction costs have nearly doubled.”
Mr. Christofides noted that “a plan should have been put in place to ensure that the needs currently met by temporary classrooms would gradually be addressed, either through classrooms within existing schools or through new schools.”
When asked to comment on the fact that in certain areas, such as Larnaca, land has been expropriated without any schools having been built, Mr. Christofides noted that “there are many considerations.”
As he said, “some areas, for example, affluent urban areas, are treated differently from certain communities.”
He also noted that “savings from technical services’ budgets have been going to specific school districts in recent years—we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of euros—while other school districts are begging for the bare necessities.”
“I think the ulterior motive is obvious—it often depends on the class structure of the population in a given area—but I’m sorry to say, it often depends on a region’s political stance as well,” he added.
Mr. Michailidis stated that “first and foremost, political issues are being raised regarding the inadequacy of the funds allocated by governments in recent years.”
As he noted, the second issue that arises concerns “the Ministry of Education’s failure to implement the projects that have been planned.”
“In our view, this is due to the fact that the technical services of the Ministry of Education insist on applying methods for implementing public works in 2026 that were used 30, 40, or 50 years ago,” said Mr. Michaelides.
“It is truly unacceptable that state school buildings, instead of serving as models and being superior to those in the private sector, are in many cases even dangerous for our children,” he concluded.
Source: CNA
