World Teachers' Day: Union bemoans decline in education in Kogi

  

    The Kogi State chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Secondary Schools (ASUSS) has bemoaned the decline in education fortunes in the state over the past few years.

   ASUSS in a press statement issued on Thursday  in Lokoja on the occasion of this year's World Teachers' Day and signed by its Chairman, Ranti Ojo and Secretary, Ogwu Sunday, pointed out that the secondary education sub in sector in particular,  had suffered neglect in all of its ramifications over the years.

  According to the union leaders, the secondary education sector has been bedeviled with myriads of problems ranging from poor and dilapidated structure to absence of instructional materials, laboratories, libraries and dearth of teachers. "The situation is so bad that there are secondary schools in this state, where all subjects are offered as at 2017 that still have less than four teachers. "These same schools prepare students to sit for external examinations like WASSCE and SSCE by WAEC and NECO respectively.

     "The above state of affairs has been made worse and very critical with the screening exercise embarked upon by the current administration in the state which is yet to be concluded. "The screening exercise resulted in the non-payment of salaries to a reasonable number of teachers ranging from six to twenty one months. "This is aside is the decision of this government to politicize the employment and payment of the 500 teachers who went through all the due processes of employment and were employed in October 2015 by the Teaching Service omission," the statement said. 

    "We therefore call on government to as a matter of urgency resolve all the industrial relations issues in our educational institutions, create enabling environment for teachers to teach in freedom so that they can be empowered to perform their duties maximally", the statement said.  The statement noted that "destroying any nation or state does not require the use of atomic bombs or the use of long range missiles, adding that "it only requires the lowering of the quality of education through lip-service to education.