….Reduced to classroom teachers

BY PETER OKUTU
TWELVE Principals of various Secondary Schools within Ebonyi Central and Ebonyi South Senatorial district of Ebonyi State were Wednesday suspended indefinitely for their alleged involvement in illegal collection of 2.919 million naira from students during registration for West African Examination Council, WAEC and National Examination Council, NECO, in the State.

The suspension of these Principals was consequent upon their refusal to refund various sums of money as directed by the State Government through the Ministry of Education for the examination fees which they duly accessed in their respective schools.

In a reaction, the Commissioner for Education in the State, Chief Hyacinth Ikpor stated that the Principals were suspended owing to their apathetic interest to refund the illegal monies they had embezzled from their respective schools. He added that the Principals would only be recalled as soon as they clear their indebtedness with evidence of receipt of payment.

According to Ikpor: “The government of Ebonyi State paid examination subsidy to all the students in Ebonyi State who are taking WAEC, NECO examination and we normally pay this money to Principals using their Registers which they supplied to us. The condition we usually give before we pay these fees is that, students who are to sit for these exams must be persons who must have done SS2 in one school and got promoted to SS3 in the same school.

“So we use the SS3 Register to give out this money. If in the end, we find out that there are some names in the SS3 Register which were not in SS2, it means you have got names from outside to include into SS3 just to collect more money. So after such exams, we carry out an auditing exercise and compare Registers from SS2 to SS3 and see if there are some injections the Principal will pay.

“For the Principals, who are involved, we informed them and so the Auditor-General invited them to look at his findings to avoid complaints at the end. The Principals came and saw that the auditing was right and that they were guilty. Those of them who paid back were set free after giving them three months to refund the money. After three months some did not pay back. We gave them another five months and yet they refused to pay back”.

He said The list of affected schools were Community Secondary Schools, Obeagu Onueke, Community Secondary School Okpuitumo Ikwo, Community Secondary School, Ndiagu Inyimagu Odomowo, Onueke, Community Secondary School, Oshiegbe, onueke, Community Secondary School, Ekka, onueke, Community Secondary School Ndiagu Igbudu Ikwo, onueke, Community Secondary School, Abina Ikwo, Onueke, Umunna, Community Secondary School Afikpo, Ugwuangwu Secondary School, Union Secondary School Agueke Isu, Afikpo, Government Secondary School, Owutu Edda, Afikpo, and Amasari Secondary School Amasiri, Afikpo.