The Kaduna State Universal Basic Education Board (KADSUBEB), says it has dismissed 2,357 teachers who failed the recently conducted competency test.
Its spokesperson, Mrs. Hauwa Mohammed, in an issued press statement yesterday in Kaduna, said the Board conducted a competency test for over 30,000 teachers in Dec. 2021.
She explained that 2,192 primary school teachers, including the National President of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), Audu Amba, had been dismissed for refusing to sit for the competency test.
She said that some 165 of the 27,662 teachers that sat for the competency test were also sacked for poor performances.
Recall that the Kaduna State Government in 2018 sacked 21,780 teachers who failed a competency test, and replaced them with 25,000 others recruited through vigorous processes. In December 2021, the Board also sacked 233 teachers over alleged possession of fake certificates.
Mrs. Mohammed said teachers who scored between 40 and 74 percent did not meet up with the minimum pass mark, adding that they would be given a second chance to improve their capacities.
The Board, she said has initiated viable training programmes for teachers under its statutory Teacher Professional Development (TPD), with support from the State Government and development partners.
Reacting, the NUT State Chairman, Ibrahim Dalhatu, dismissed the competency test and described the sacking of the affected teachers as “illegal”.
Dalhatu said the Union had secured a court order restraining the Board from conducting the competency test, adding, however, that it conducted the test without recourse to the rule of law.
He recalled that the Union had asked the teachers not to write the examination after learning that the intent was to sack them.
When contacted, the NUT National President said he was aware of the development, adding that the National Executive Council of the union would sit on Wednesday, June 22 to come up with a position.
