By Francis Igata, Chinedu Adonu & Ifunanya Ozougwu

ENUGU—The Enugu State House of Assembly,on Thursday, nullified the concluded recruitment of 2,000 primary school teachers in 340 schools over acute irregularities that marred the exercise conducted by the Enugu State Universal Basic Education Board, ENSUBEB.

The House had last Tuesday,summoned the Chairman,ENSUBEB,Ikeje Asogwa,and the Permanent Secretary,Mrs. Roseline Chiama,to appear yesterday,to explain why the concluded recruitment of 2,000 teachers for the primary schools will not be nullified or extended to accommodate very qualified persons who applied.

Also,the House has backed the moves by the Enugu State Capital Territory Development Authority, ECTDA, to demolish illegal structures built on waterways,drainage channels and on top of public utilities which has caused lagoons to spring up in parts of the metropolis even as the entire city has been tipped over the cliffhanger for flood disaster.

House members and the entire public who thronged the Assembly Complex to witness the grilling of Ikeje Asogwa and Rose Chiama were rudely shocked when Chiama, revealed that,”Ikeje ran the recruitment exercise as his private dynasty.

“The Board was denied opportunity to make contributions whether foolish or otherwise. Ikeje is Mr. Know all. I am calling for the cancellation of the exercise.”
Speaker, Edward Ubosi, realizing that Mrs. Chiama was simmering for more damning revelations over Ikeje’s conduct on the recruitment, quickly told her to take a bow and go.

Ubosi then announced after all the members had expressed dismay over the recruitment, that,”the House through a unanimous resolution thereby nullify the concluded recruitment exercise. That a fresh exercise should be conducted in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, ENSUBEB, all the 17 Local Government Areas, and other stakeholders.”

Test for principals, not witch-hunt
Also on Thursday, chairman, Enugu State Post Primary School Management Board, PPSMB, Mr Nestor Ezeme appealed to parents and guardians in Enugu State to send their children and wards to government owned schools because they had better teachers just as education was free in the state.

Ezeme spoke in an interview with Vanguard in Enugu shortly after meeting with all the over 800 school principals in the state.
“Secondary education in Enugu State is free. The only levies approved include N1,000 Equipment Levy, N200 unified examination fee, N100 sports fee and N1000 Parents’ Fee, bringing the total to N2,300.”

Commenting on the recent examination for school principals, Ezeme said that the exercise was a quality assurance programme and not aimed at witch-hunting anybody.

“We want our principals to go to school every day and ensure that their teachers come to school and do their jobs. That is the essence of the quality assurance programme we organised.

“It is meant to keep them fit and abreast to the policies of this board. As an educationist, the principal just like any other staff is supposed to be updated once in a while. Nothing more, nothing less.

“The quality assurance examination is now to be conducted every year before the beginning of any session. I have the powers by law to remove any principal without any test. I do not need a test to remove any principal,” he said.

The Chairman who had earlier met the principals before the interview said it was routine meeting usually called towards the beginning of every session to discuss the way forward in the public schools.

Meanwhile, Ezeme has said that the PPSMB had stopped what he described as a habit by school principals to collect unauthorised levies from their students as well as coming to the board to falsify their service years through the assistance of some unscrupulous officials.

He stressed that the board had been imposing fines on teacher and deducting such fines at source over alleged offences to serve as detriment for others to sit up and face their jobs.

“When we assumed office last year we realised that people do come to headquarters to pay money to extend their service years; now we have been able to put that to a halt.

“When we came here, the public schools were in shambles, but today, we can beat our chests and say we have brought back our teachers to the classrooms,” he stated.