FG, implement Teachers Special Salary Structure

I want to start by congratulating our president for the successes recorded so far in some significant areas. However, there are still some areas where I would want the present administration to look into. One of such is the approval of the Teachers Special Salary Structure (TSSS), which was rejected by the former administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

Teachers cannot contemplate saving for the rainy day, they live from hand to mouth. Something drastic must be done to cushion the insalubrious financial constraints of the oldest profession on planet earth and the nucleus of other professions.

Efficiency has become a thing of the past in our educational sector because of lack of good wages for teachers. Good wage is a catalyst to economic growth and technological develop-ment. Good wage is what can encourage viable attitude to work. There is no singular reasonable individual who would pray to lose a lucrative job. But many do not want to go into the teaching profession because the wage there is poor.

It is disheartening to read in dailies that all other professions in Nigeria have their own stable special salary structure except the teaching profession. What a slap? In our country, a school certificate holder can become a councilor and he starts getting a whooping sum of N150, 000 per month while teachers get N150, 000 per year.

If something quick is not done to redress this situation, I foresee deterioration, inefficiency and ineffectiveness in our educational sector. Because the primary aim of teachers will be diverted to other things to eke a living at the detriment of their assignment. The panacea to this predicament is for the federal government to expedite action on the Teachers Special Salary Structure.

Bill Clinton, former United State’s president said, while declaring open the International Conference on Education in 1998 that “the 21st century must be the century of education and the teachers.” The expression amplifies the indispensability of teachers. On this final note, President Yar’Adua should approve the Teachers Special Salary Structure so that his name would be remembered forever.

Olayiwola Adedapo Fire,
geofire@yahoo.com

Ekiti AC lawmakers should face their legislative duties  

Let me use this medium to advise members of the Action Congress (AC) in the Ekiti State House of Assembly. They have to face the business of legislation for which they were elected and leave Governor Segun Oni to carry on with his function as head of executive arm of the state government.

The position recently expressed by one of the AC lawmakers over the nominees of boards, commissions, agencies and parastatals sent to the House of Assembly by Governor Oni for screening and confirmation is not only self-serving but smacks of political hypocrisy.

By making noise over the nomination of only members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for appointment into boards, commissions, agencies and parastatals, the AC lawmakers have shown that they appear not to know the difference between a presidential system of government and parliamentary system of government.

For the avoidance of doubt, it is only in a parliamentary government that you talk about sharing executive positions in accordance with parties’ membership strength in the house of assembly. But in a presidential system that is in practice in Nigeria , the party that is in control of the executive arm controls the government.

Appointments into boards and commissions are the prerogative of the president or governor as the case may be. He has the power to appoint whoever he so wishes without recourse to anyone. Or is there any portion of our constitution that says appointments into the executive arm must be based on parties’ membership strength in the house of assembly?

Besides, it smacks of political hypocrisy for members of the AC to be crying to the roof tops that the list of nominees comprises of only members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) because the same AC had earlier rejected overtures to be part of Oni’s government. Even at the national level, the party also declined to accept positions allocated to it by the Yar’Adua-led government.

 It is therefore imperative that the AC lawmakers get themselves educated on the functions of the three arms of government. They should know that it is absolutely impossible to eat ones cake and still have it. AC is in the opposition in Ekiti State while PDP is the party in power. AC members in the house of assembly should therefore focus on the business of legislation for which they were elected.

They should also realise the consequences of their seeming unprogressive attitude, because Ekiti people can no longer accept a situation where every time a bill that is meant to affect the lives of Ekiti people positively is before the house of assembly, the AC lawmakers must find reasons to prolong its passage.

Comrade Ebenezer Olaleye,
Secretary, Ekiti Justice and Equity Movement (EJEM),
Ekiti State.