Absorbing Teachers into County Workforce is a Crime Against the Poor!

“You know what? Before we start blaming outside forces, we must first look inwards and excommunicate the demons within...” Those are the sweet words from my late father, Mzee Lemukol Ng'asike Snr.

Now, let’s come closer home and put this thing called illiteracy into perspective. Is education failure in places like Turkana County as a result of some invisible satanic spirits, national government laxity or just a case of a non-interventionist approach from people we blindly call sons and daughters of the soil?

As much as we apportion blame to national authorities, I believe their local counterparts have serious questions to answer. 

I have moved around Turkana – to its deepest and remotest corners. Seeing children populating kraals during school days despite the presence of a school just across the road demystifies that old notion that children in pastoral lands don't attend classes due to lack of schools. There is something big. An ailment that is geared towards crippling the poor from the source. To lock their minds. To disempower them by building schools and “poaching” the few teachers sent by the Teachers Service Commission to teach them.

Listening to parents urging me not to condemn their children for being at home brought me to a new level. That of scanning public decisions no matter how good they may appear. These people told me that though inexistent school infrastructure could be an issue in other places, their major setback is lack of teachers. That “even the few that were initially posted there were taken by the county government”. I have heard this narrative not just in a single village. It is everywhere.

Which reignited my usual question: in whose side is the county government?  

This is purely a question of interests vis-a-vis politicians, teachers seeking “greener pastures”, society and the vulnerable – particularly the poor and their children. The hierarchical placement of each of these interests shows where exactly the weight lies and how far it will take to change things in favour of the pastoral child.

Let’s unpack this conundrum.

The politician wants to appear benevolent by hiring all professionals. He, undoubtedly, hinges not on the needs of the wider society. It is common knowledge. He is in it to win goals for his side. It is an open political market, you know.

The teacher, like any other creature, has his stomach as the benchmark for his decisions. He wants a full pocket. For your information teachers have created a niche for themselves as major village political mobilisers. Get this from me: in those places I have visited, the teacher is everything. He is a consultant, a mobile library and a trustee on anything public. Good attributes but deployed in poisoned grounds.

The society banks on both the politician and the teacher for support – mental and material. Its vulnerability has, however, elevated its risk status. It may complain and even point out all the problems afflicting it, but it is handicapped. It can't move far. It cries but acts not.

And so, if the society is handicapped, how then should we expect it to curtail the afflictions facing the children? That is where we must come in.

 

Well, there is this thing people call qualifications and the need to offer “any person” a chance to move to a “higher office” so long as he/she is qualified. Then there is this other aspect that remains at the periphery of this exodus. It touches on the impact moving to “higher offices” brings to the society. 

Though many people have argued that teachers have what it takes to be part of this “economic nomadism”, I still hold the view that this argument is hollow and suppresses the voices of the primary beneficiaries of the teaching profession – the children. I agree with people who say devolution has contributed in killing the education sector in the so called marginalised zones.

Then we come to what informs leadership. Should public decisions be informed by the urgency to elevate individual interests at the expense of public needs? Where is honesty in our preachings about promoting education among pastoralists?

Yes, teachers can serve in other capacities but we must agree that their initial postings play a central role in community development.

If the county government won't function minus teachers, then it should be ready to pay the price for its actions. Let it hire double the number of teachers it poached and facilitate their stay in those teacher-less schools. These new teachers should be made to feel that they are the pillars of the society.

By admitting that our people are poor and need special support, this county bureaucracy admits it’s guilty of a crime against the poor. It must reinvent its policies in support of interests of children so as to offload this guilty verdict.

Lemukol Ng’asike is an architect. Email: lemoseh89@gmail.com . Twitter: @mlemukol.