Teacher can’t read own certificate?When the late Afrobeat legend, Fela Anikulapo-Kutisang his popular number, Teacher, Don’t Teach MeNonsense, many thought it was just a song but thesong had become a reality in time. It was sometime in 2011, when Governor AdamsOshiomhole paid an unscheduled visit to a primaryschool in Edo North senatorial district of the statethat he found out the rot which has pervaded theUniversal Basic Education in the state. For someone who has embarked on massiveconstruction and rehabilitation of schools in thecountry of course, he must be concerned with thequality of teachers in these schools. Oshiomholebeckoned on a teacher in the school and asked himwhat are his workings hours. The teacher could not answer and said I don’t know and later murmured“7am to 4pm Sir”. Oshiomhole and one of the state’s teacher A visibly shocked Oshiomhole now called a pupiland asked, “where is your teacher? The teacherstanding beside him replied on behalf of the pupil“na me”. That was when the governor knew thathe has a serious problem in the educational sector. A week after the incident, a group of UniversalBasic Education teachers who were at theGovernment House in Benin to protest their nonabsorption into the state teaching service stormedthe state government House, unknown to them thegovernor was waiting for such an opportunity to bare his mind on the rot in the system. Whileaddressing the UBE teachers he asserted thatemployment into the state teaching service will nolonger be automatic, adding that the applicant mustshow competence beyond paper qualification. He said to them, “the governor does not have aguaranteed job, therefore nobody can have one.You must go through proper interview. The systemmust be convinced that you have what it takes tobe a good teacher”. He stressed that the systemmust go through progressive change to ensure that education is restored to its pride of place,stressing there are teachers who cannot speakEnglish. “Whatever they were doing before, wehave to review it in the light of current experience.We have teachers who cannot speak English. Iasked a teacher last week what the working hours were. He did not know, he said 7am to 4pm. And Iasked a pupil, where is your teacher? The teachersaid, ‘na me’. The governor disclosed thatgovernment was going to employ teachers to fillthe existing vacancies, but it must be based onmerit and not geographical area. While noting that government will weed outunproductive teachers from the school system torestore the dignity of education, the Governorstressed that government cannot guarantee jobsfor all UBE graduates simply because they havepassed through teacher training. He however assured them that government would direct theUniversal Basic Education Board to commerce theprocess of employment of teachers. “l appreciatethat after going through teacher training, youexpect that you would be employed, but it wouldnot be automatic”. And following his resolve to clean up the mess in the system, the governorcommenced the recruitment of teachers andsaddled members of the State Universal EducationBoard (SUBEB) with the responsibility to recruitteachers. But the governor got another shock of hislife, when petitions started flying around that the members were receiving bribe to recruitunqualified teachers. Saturday Vanguard wasreliably informed that an official of the Board sleptwith a female whom he promised to giveemployment but at the end of the day refused tofulfill his promise even after sleeping with her. As a result, the governor in collaboration with the stateHouse of Assembly dissolved the Board chaired byHon. Joseph Emoabino and cancelled therecruitment exercise. While Mr Omorotiomwan wassworn-in as Commissioner. Worried by the mess inthe educational sector, the state called for a town hall meeting with a view to find solution to theproblems in that sector. But before the town hallmeeting, there was an audit of primary schoolteachers in the state and it was revealed massivefalsification of age of Primary School Teachers in theState Public Schools. But the teachers and the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in thestate saw the governor’s action differently. Theyalleged that it was because the teachers went onstrike that the state government decided to punishthem. They even alleged that it was because theGovernor was accused of not having his primary school certificate by the PDP governorshipcandidate in the last governorship election,Gen.Charles Airhiavbere that informed thegovernor’s reform in the sector. Though they werereminded that the court had quashed thoseallegations, after it declared that Airhiavbere failed to prove any of the allegations against thegovernor. However the town hall meeting held penultimateweek and all the stakeholders were on hand tobare their minds. While declaring the meeting open,Oshiomhole who was the first to pull the triggerdisclosed that from the audit carried out by theState’s Information and Communications Technology, 789 teachers out of 1,379 obtainedtheir Primary School Leaving Certificates before theage of 8 or 9. He said “some of the records showthere were a few who were particularly gifted andthey finished primary school before they wereborn. We found that of all our primary school teachers, only 1,287 representing 9% out of14,484 teachers have proper records in oursystem. 91% have various forms of discrepanciesin their records. About 1,379 teachers representing11.5% claim that they obtained their Primary SchoolCertificates after they had been employed as teachers. In fact, some obtained their PrimarySchool Certificates not more than two years ago,from the school in which they were employed asteachers. The question is whether they went toTeachers’ Training College or obtained NationalCertificate of Education (NCE) before they went to primary school. These are facts that have been welldocumented. It would not be helpful to the causeof education and our resolve to deliver qualityeducation to our pupils if we do not deal with thisissue decisively”. The Governor who reeled out statistics on theteachers-student ratio in all the Local Governmentsin the State said the average of 30 students perteacher in the State is much lower than the UNESCOrecommendation on student-teacher ratio sayingthis might mean that there are more teachers in the State primary schools than needed. While notingthat there were positives from the audit, theGovernor said there are more female teachers thanmale teachers in the State and that “in some cases,we have more female pupils in schools than maleand that is very encouraging, because in some States, they are still battling with how to get theirfemale children to school, but that is not the case inEdo.” He also noted that “as a result of the steps wehave taken to restore confidence and integrity toour Public Schools, there has been a steadyincrease in enrolment in Public Junior Secondary Schools in the State. The Governor who said thetown hall meeting on education was called to find asolution to the problems said the Government wasopen to suggestions on the way forward.Some ofthe stakeholders at the town hall meeting includingthe State Chairman of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, Comrade Patrick Ikosimi, the Aidenojie of SouthIbie, H.R.H Kelvin Danesi, the Ojirrua of Irrua, H.R.HWilliam Momodu, Comrade Jude Obasanmi,Chairman, Conference of Non GovernmentalOrganizations in Edo State, Rev. Asibor, Mr. Efe John,Mrs. Rosemary Abode and others urged the Governor to take a tough decision to properlysanitize the education sector. Determined, to sanitize the system despite thecriticism from the PDP and some teachers, the StateGovernment invited 1,300 Primary School teacherswho have irregularities in their educationcertificates and age records to appear before averification committee to defend themselves. This was made known at a meeting GovenorOshiomhole held with the leadership of the stateNigeria Labour Congress (NLC) led by ComradeEmmanuel Ademokun and the Nigeria Union ofTeachers (NUT) led by Comrade Patrick Ikosimi. TheGovernor said that the exercise is not to witch-hunt anybody however insisted that it would not bebusiness as usual and that those who have becometoo old to teach will have to give way. Oshiomholesaid “it is not my wish to preside over dismissals,first it is not cheap. Secondly, I have a responsibilityto keep Edo going and ensure that our children are in good hands of teachers who are senile and alsostill strong to stand and competent to teach. If thefacts reveal that there are teachers in the classroomwho do not have the requisite qualification, youcannot insist that they remain in the system. The good news is that those who are not too old,who are capable of training, if we find that they aredeficient and it is possible for them to benefit fromtraining, we will give them training, what is notacceptable is to say it is business as usual. We canmismanage everything in our country, if you mismanage education, you are killing ourtomorrow, our collective future. The roads we arebuilding, we won’t have brains to look over them.In the absence of brains, we won’t have growthand development. I have asked the Ministry ofEducation to invite those category of teachers whose number is about one thousand threehundred who from the records appear to havestarted their Primary School before they were bornto come and speak to the fact because we are notassuming that those documents are iron-cast.” TheGovernor said the Primary School teachers will be paid their monthly salary which was withheld whilethey embarked on strike. And on the day of the verification exercise, it wasdrama at Asologun Primary School, Ikpoba OkhaLocal Government Area, Benin City, Mrs AugustaOdemwinge could not read a sworn affidavit shetendered as part of her credentials. GovernorAdams Oshiomhole who paid an unscheduled visit to the State Staff Training Centre venue of theexercise was appalled that a teacher could notread, saying “if you can’t read, what do you teachthe pupils, what do you write on the board?”Chairman of the state Nigeria Union of Teachers,Comrade Patrick Ikosimi who was also at the screening to monitor the exercise said the woman’sfailure was “an embarrassment”. On arrival at thecentre, the governor took time to peruse some ofthe teacher’s credentials and documents presented.When Mrs. Odenwingie took her turn for theexercise, the Governor who listened to her defence asked her to read the affidavit she presented,however, she was stuttering and read the affidavitas if a kindergarten were learning to read, to the consternation of everybody around. Chairman ofthe Nigeria Union of Teachers NUT, ComradeIkosimi who described Mrs Odemwingie failure as an embarrassment said the union was in tune withthe state government on the need to sanitize theschool system. He said: “We are committed topartnering with the government to repositionEducation in the state. What this teacher has justdisplayed is a show of shame, it shows the decadence in the education sector. As the chairmanof NUT, I have written to the governor that we arein total support of what he is doing. He shouldproperly involve the NUT so that together we canfish out the culprits who are not viable as far as thesystem is concerned,” he said. Reacting to the situation, the state Commissioner ofHigher Education, Mr Washington Osifo, said: “Werepresent the trust of the people. We will do whatthe people want us to do. But I think we are not farfrom the people, the people want quality servicedelivery, we will not also shy away from that. We will not have those who are not qualified manningsuch sector. You cannot invest tax payers money todevelop any sector particularly the educationalsector. Because it is very critical, it is a recruitingground for other sectors of the economy. We areteaching leaders of tomorrow so we must ensure we give them the best. If a teacher cannot putwords together then he cannot be in the classroom. There is no sentiment about it. The only thingshe was able to pronounce that day was her name,and it is very embarrassing to the stategovernment. I have not been able to recover from that shock. Yes it was bad but it is not incurablybad. All the teachers are not bad, our teachers aresound but we want it better and that is why weembarked on the reform. The Governor wants thebest for our children and we are working towardsthat direction”.