By our Reporters @ Katsina times
Primary school teachers under the Bakori Local Government Education Authority (BLEA) have renewed calls for urgent intervention over what they describe as ongoing injustice, illegal salary deductions, and a newly exposed employment fraud affecting the education sector in the area.
According to the teachers, every month, some of their colleagues are randomly selected and denied their full salaries or receive nothing at all, without explanation. Some go for two to three months without pay, and even when the payments resume, the lost earnings are never refunded. Numerous complaints to relevant authorities — including traditional leaders and the local branch of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) — have yielded no lasting solution.
They find it particularly troubling that the teachers’ salaries, which are centrally disbursed by the state government, can be tampered with arbitrarily and without accountability. The affected teachers are calling on Katsina State Governor, Malam Dikko Umaru Radda, to intervene and end what they describe as ongoing exploitation.
Meanwhile, new revelations have further compounded the crisis. Reports indicate that several teachers — particularly female teachers — remain on BLEA’s payroll despite relocating with their husbands to other towns across the country. These absentee teachers are said to have arranged for unemployed individuals to teach in their place, paying them stipends in return.
Sources allege that these unlawful arrangements are made in connivance with some officials within the leadership of the BLEA. “There are teachers who have not set foot in their assigned schools for over three years, yet they still receive full salaries,” one source revealed.
The revelations have sparked fresh outrage, especially among unemployed graduates who are actively seeking teaching jobs in the state.
Stakeholders are now calling on the state government to conduct a thorough investigation into the operations of BLEA — both in the handling of teachers’ salaries and the legitimacy of its staff list — and to sanction all those found complicit.
“This is more than a case of salary denial. It is about systemic abuse, fraud, and the future of education in Bakori,” said one affected teacher.
As the situation unfolds, teachers and concerned residents await the government's next steps in what has become a growing education scandal in Katsina State.
Efforts to speak with Bakori local government education secretary was not successful.he didn't take our correspondent calls nor answer the texts sent to him.
Katsina times
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