By JEROME OBOMIGIE

The basic aim of government of any nation is to reduce the sufferings of her citizenry to the barest minimum. The federal government saw the hardship that teachers in primary schools were passing through hence the establishment of the National Primary School Commission to take charge of the payment of primary school teachers’ salaries all over the states of the federation. It then means that salaries of teachers are to be deducted at source from the allocations of the various local government councils for the payment of teachers trough the National Primary School Commission and U.B.E. Board of the various states. With this development, the teachers were relived from prolong sufferings that they were passing through when they were fully under their local councils. Prior to this time, teachers were staying for months without payment of their salaries. This phenomenon drove so many talented teachers away from the teaching profession.

Education is the hub for all human development. It is the watershed that all human activities took their roots. Those that have a stake in this enterprise should not toy with it so as to make our educational endeavour more relevant to the modern standard. Since 1973 till date, a lot of concerted efforts have been made by the federal and state governments to restructure and consolidate the educative process. The educational sector is always given a pride of place in the scheme of things by the military and civilian governments to make it viable so that it could be comparable with what is obtainable in some other places of the world.

In Edo State primary sector of education, things are totally distorted and disorganised because of the placement of round pegs in square holes. This was as a result of the handwork of the defunct P.D.P. government of the state. The philosophy of the party which was “let us share the money” was injected into the board. With this motive in mind, some people of questionable character were brought into the U.B.E. board. These were people who were ready to dance to the whims and caprices of their political godfathers. Attested to the above claim was the last recruitment of primary school teachers all over the state. The board was plunged into all forms of shady deals. Some teachers recruited into the service were shown the way out several times until the final approval was given barely some months ago.

When the political table eventually turned, the tail feathers of the pea-cock were blown open for everybody to take a glance at so as to see the ills perpetuated by the previous government. Immediately the people’s governor took over the government, he saw the damage that was done to the educational sector. The governor wasted no time to address all the problems confronting the primary level of education. To arrest this situation, he appointed the present chairman of the board to put right all the wrong doings lashed on this sector. This move was highly resisted by the P.D.P legislators in the state House of Assembly as they saw this as an impediment to the nefarious activities. With the dogged political battle put up by the governor in court, the battle was won in favour of the governor and the new chairman of the board. The steps that the present chairman is taking now is an indication that the board is set to purge all forms of shady dealings.

The most glaring of these steps was the screening of the newly recruited teachers to fish out those of them that passed through the back door to secure employments. Without doubts, there is hope that more revelation of this ugly trends would be uncovered. Those that would be caught in the web should be fired from their offices. The search for culprits should not only be limited to the head office alone but as well the local education authorities in the state at large. Though the task ahead is very tedious but the new chairman should not relent on his oars to allow cheat and fraud to prevail. There is definitely an ambush of a cabal that would like to maintain the status quo. The new chairman should not be deterred by empty threats. It is a well known fact that heroes and heroines are not known during the time of boom but in a period near doom like this era.

There are some serious issues which the new chairman should not loose sight of in order to move the frontiers of education in Edo State forward. First and foremost is to make the salaries of the field and office workers of the board uniform. This is because in the educational sector, it is possible for an officer to opt out from the office for the field. As it is done in the ministry of health, the same should be extended to the education sector. The teachers’ salaries scale should reflect all the cadres in the educational sector as well.

Secondly, infra-structural facilities should also be provided in schools. In some schools, there are dilapidated buildings that hinder the upbringing of our youngsters. More funds should be released by the board to erect new buildings. In addition to the above, teaching aids should also be provided to facilitate teaching and learning in Edo state primary schools.

Another problem confronting the educational sector is lack of teachers especially in the rural areas of the state. In the last recruitment exercise, most teachers were thrown into local government areas different from their own. Barely few months that these teachers were employed, some have started going back to their local government areas. With this development, the tendency to experience acute shortage of teachers in some rural areas is very certain. In order to check this ugly trend, newly employed teachers should be made to teach in local government areas that they were employed for at least a period of five years before seeking for transfer to local government areas of their choice.

Closely related to the above is the selection of teachers for seminars to enhance their professional competency. In most primary schools, this is done haphazardly. Some school-heads and officials in the local education authorities of the state are now trading with this good gesture of stakeholders in our education industry.

In most cases, teachers in the good books of these school heads are the only ones featuring in these seminars. In some instances, the officials in the local education authorities of the state and the head-teachers themselves would attend these seminars. And these are people who are not teaching the pupils. This should be looked into critically by stakeholders. Henceforth head teachers and local education authorities’ personnel of the state who are found in these seminars meant for classroom teachers should be penalised. Their sole aim for attending these seminars is the money involved and nothing more. The classroom teachers would gain knowledge of which the pupils they are teaching would benefit from maximally.

The transfer of teachers is another problem that the teachers of Edo State are passing through in the hands of the officials of the local education authorities. Most teachers are intentionally sent to distant places from their areas of duty – posts. This is done so that victims would come to their offices to bribe their ways through. And there are some staff that are sacred cows that cannot be touched if even they have over-stayed in their duty-posts for years. This is man inhumanity to man which the stakeholders in our education should critically examined to prevent future occurrence. In the writer’s humble suggestion, primary school teaches should not be posted more than three kilometers away from their duty-posts.

The promotion of teachers is another area to be looked into by stakeholders in the education industry. Promotion is done haphazardly to allow just anything to go. Like in Lagos and some other states of Nigeria, promotion examinations should be conducted for teachers before given promotions. The idea of promoting teachers enmasse makes teachers to be very lazy. This should be done away with in our educational enterprise.

Lastly and most importantly is that graduate teaches should be made to head schools as it is done in Kogi, Benue and some other states. This is because these crops of personnel will be able to stimulate the educative process to greater and enviable heights. The educational sector needs men that would be able to launch it towards the scientific orbit. It is only when the right caliber of personnel are made to steer the ship of education that Nigeria would be able to compare favourably with other nations of the world.

The educational sector is quite different from other sectors. This is because it is the only sector that is capable of turning out human products. And as such there is a dire need to reconstruct and consolidate this sector so that it would be able to perform this task adequately. As a result, all impediments should be removed to pave way for the quick realisation of this task.

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