The Nigeria Union of Teachers, Osun State wing has described as ill-advised and untimely the state government’s plan to organise a training exercise for its members, saying teachers were broke and could not afford to pay any fee now.
The NUT declared that teachers in the state could not afford the training fees due to financial crisis imposed on them by the economic crunch being experienced throughout the country.
Rising from a one-day State Executive Council meeting held on Thursday at the state secretariat in Osogbo, the teachers asked the state government to be responsible for the payment of the training and other fees involved in the programme.
According to a communique issued at the end of the meeting and signed by the state NUT Chairman, Wakeel Amudah and Publicity Secretary, T. Basorun, the state government should also remunerate participants at the training programme, in line with the practice all over the world.
Commending the Rafiu Aregbesola administration for its attention on the education sector, the union, however, expressed pain and disappointment against the state government for attempting to bring up the training at a time when the teachers’ purses had grown lean.
The teachers also rejected attempt by the government to use aptitude test as a criterion for promoting them, questioning why such a measure should be applied to only teachers out of all the categories of workers in the state civil service.
The communique made available to our correspondent partly reads: “The State Wing Executive Council of NUT is pained and therefore constrained to observe that the current arrangement on ground by the state government to mount another retraining at this period is ill-advised and untimely.
“The SWEC-in-session observed that the current economic downturn being experienced by our members all over the state will be tantamount to adding more burden and pains to their (teachers) psyche, emotion and lean purse.
“The SWEC-in-session observed that the government be fully responsible for the payment of training and other fees involved in the programme, furthermore participants should be remunerated after the training in line with the best practices all over the world.
“The SWEC-in-session would take exception in using any aptitude test as a criteria for promotion. After all, it is not only teachers that are in the civil service of Osun state.
“The leadership of Nigeria Union of Teachers and state wing executive council in session resolved at these positions to empathise with our members’ economic condition and the predicament they are presently going through.”
