Teachers’ verification in Edo State

The Teachers' verification in Edo State is a step in the right
direction, if not for anything, to clean the system and upgrade the
teaching and learning standards in our schools. As a native, Edo State
is one of the states whose citizens excelled in examinations (both
internal and external) in the good old days. The recent verification
to bring back that lost glory is a good omen.
Though a lot of people have written against the exercise and even the
comrade governor, I will rather commend his effort aimed at bringing
sanity to our educational system.
There is no doubt that the exercise might have revealed a lot of
irregularities like falsification of results, age and other documents,
one of which was the recent revelation of a teacher's inability to
read her sworn affidavit in the presence of our action governor. It is
worthy of commendation also to note that since his inception as the
State Chief Executive Officer, Adams Oshiomhole never gave out any
contract without personally supervising it. He has condemned many
contractors in the past for shoddy jobs and dismissed security
officers who went outside their beats, just to mention but a few.
The teachers' verification, though the result is yet to be made
public, will sanitise the system and examination malpractices. With
unemployment and economic deprivation, one would not expect anything
less just for these desperate people to get means of livelihood,
particularly in a state where education is the highest employer of
labour.
I want to appeal to the comrade governor who was ingenious enough to
absorb this teeming unemployed youths when he assumed office as the
governor of Edo State to also temper justice with mercy like his Oyo
State counterpart recently did. Observable shortcomings can be
corrected through teachers' motivational programmes like seminars,
part-time training and provision of adequate instructional materials
including textbooks that could aid teaching and learning in the
school. The inspectorate division should also rise to its task of
supervision to avoid future lapses. The Ministry of Education should
explore the avenue of unified examinations at both primary and
secondary schools in the state to enhance the spirit of competition
amongst schools. Clubs and societies such as debate, drama, art,
literary etc that could help improve pupils' academic performances
should be introduced or revived in our educational system.
As the father of the state, he should handle the exercise with the
maturity it requires so as not to further congest the already
saturated labour market in the country.