Some workers have condemned the directive by the Kaduna State government compelling teachers to write a fresh teachers’ competence test.
They described it as a way to downsize the workforce in the teaching profession in the State.
However, others see it as a calculated attempt by the state government to rejig, restructure and reposition the education sector in the State to an enviable standard.
The State Chairman of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) Comrade Ibrahim Dalhatu, had in Kaduna on Wednesday, November 17, 2021, during a stakeholders’ meeting, said the body would not present their members for another test.
Comrade Dalhatu, who said a similar test was conducted for 25,000 teachers in 2017, during which 3,000 teachers were said to have passed the test, sending about 22,000 teachers to the labour market.
However, during the conduct of a fresh computer-based test for 35,000 teachers in three centres across Kaduna State on December 7, 2021, Chairman of the State Universal Basic Education Board, Alhaji Tijjani Abdullahi dismissed the alleged motive of using the competence test to sack teachers, just as he told all the participating teachers that the test was not to witch-hunt anyone.
He said it would serve as a test for competence, and to identify gaps in the subject areas for the purpose of training and retraining the teachers, adding that it was not meant to sack teachers.
“The teachers that are here will see the difference in the approach of the testing,” he said.
However, a former Head of teachers with the Kajuru LGA area of the State, Alhaji Ibrahim Ningi condemned the policy of the State government, noting that “it’s not only when government conducts competence tests that it would retrain teachers.
“The Kaduna State government must be sincere to teachers. Training and retraining of teachers in subject areas do not require competence test. It’s a must in the teaching profession for teachers to always undergo training and improve their academic qualifications.
“That is why you see teachers from primary schools being moved to secondary, and tertiary institutions as lecturers. It’s because they underwent training,” he said.
