Law and order issues have increased immensely this year in West New Britain Province due to the eviction exercise carried out by the Provincial government. The academic year was affected for schools with some schools being broken into, teachers and staff being attacked and students as well. “Last year, we only had one or two law and order issues in the schools.” “This year was a worst year for us where we had tried to manage the situation by suspending classes and once the issues were sorted out, we resumed classes again,” said Provincial Education Advisor, Mr Paul Laure. Laure said that by suspending classes for schools affected, the surrounding communities would take the initiative and hand over the culprits involved to the police to deal with. “Once the culprits were brought forward and turned in to the police, the classes resumed.” Laure said that since this was a major issue that they faced this year, he had spoken to the Provincial Police Commander to carry out awareness on law and order issues to schools in the province. He also notified all schools and had the contact details for school headmasters, principals and head teachers given to the police. He added that hopefully the awareness program will help curb the law and order issues affecting schools so they won’t have to face the same problems next year.