Teachers paying Sh120,000 for fake jobs

A job scandal in which unemployed teachers are paying up to Sh120,000 has been exposed. Teachers in some districts are paying at least Sh80,000 to conmen, according to findings of the Teachers Service Commission (TSC), whose officials have unearthed the scandal.

The victims are being targeted by an extortion ring, which authorities say is difficult be crack but which they eventually hope to stop.

So bad is the situation that the commission on Thursday sounded the alarm to the 4,000 head teachers meeting in Mombasa, asking them to be on the lookout for the extortionists and report any cases to the headquarters.

“Be careful before you accept any new teacher especially now that we are not doing any recruitment,” said deputy commission secretary Simon Kavisi who represented his boss Gabriel Lengoiboni.

Mr Kavisi said the commission had netted quite a number of bogus employment letters given by conmen to innocent job seekers.

Commission chairman Ibrahim Hussein told the Nation separately that the matter had been reported to police. “We appeal to the public not to fall into the hands of these thieves,” he said.

Most targeted are those seeking primary school teaching jobs. Some of the districts worst affected are Thika, Masaba, Trans Nzoia East and areas of Kitale. Nairobi province is also one of the areas where extortion cases have been reported. Most of the cases happened between April and June.

Letters the TSC said were fake, some seen by the Nation, claimed the teachers had been successful in their application for employment.

“The TSC has decided that you be posted to Trans Nzoia West District to teach all subjects with effect from May 5, 2009,” said one letter claimed to have been written by top officials at the commission.

On June 9, the commission wrote to the affected district officers asking them to guard against the cases of fake employment. Mr Kavisi also announced that the shortage of teachers in primary schools, initially thought to stand at about 36,000 had risen to 45,000.

That of the primary schools had also shot up from an estimated 14,000 to 22,000, meaning the crisis of the shortage was worsening.

The revelations came even as Mr Hussein on Thursday rooted for the employment of teachers on contract this year, a move that would deal a big blow to more than 50,000 teachers awaiting employment.

It is the first time the government will not be hiring the new staff in eight years, since the State lifted the freeze on teachers’ recruitment, which was first imposed in 1997 due to the economic realities of that time. Mr Hussein said the government will only put 12,600 teachers on contracts this year.

In 2008, about the same number of new teachers were hired, 8,000 of whom were meant to replace those who had left service through resignations, deaths and retirement. The rest were additional teachers who were meant to ease the crisis of teacher shortage.

Mr Hussein said the recruitment will start any time from Friday when a new financial year starts. At the secondary school level, graduates will be hired following their subject combinations as would be set by the TSC, he said.

But primary school teacher graduates will be offered jobs based on their years of graduation. It means those who graduated earlier than others will be given priority as opposed to the more recent graduates.