By Nelson Utip
The government of Cross River State has suspended 31 school principals for their involvement in WAEC examination racketeering, and manipulating the 2024 students list, embezzling some funds in the process.
The result of the investigation into alleged inflating of students list indicted the principals leading to their suspension by the State Government.
It would be recalled that Governor Bassey Otu of Cross River State had announced free WAEC Exams registration for all indegenous and resident students of the Senior Secondary School (SSS 3) in all the Public Secondary Schools, some dubious officials however connived with some Schools principals to dube the state government by registering non-indigenes and non-residents of the State for the said exams.
The Commissioner for Education in the state, Stephen Odey in a Press Conference held in his office in Calabar recently debunked claims in some quarters that the entire lists of Cross River indigenous students submitted by the Public School principals were padded and inflated, explaing that some of the lists and principals found wanting were under investigation. He said that the Cross River State governor had taken the responsibility of paying the exams fees of all indegenous students of Senior Secondary School writing West African Examinations Council (WAEC) exams for 2024 which prompted the perceived malpractices, pledging however that due diligence would be done in registering those that merit the exams.
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“In line with the directives from the governor, some principals submitted list of both indigenes and non-indigenes, while some submitted duplications of names leading to the setting up of a Disciplinary Committee. “The Committee found out that 31 principals were culpable and should be suspended, while six were exonerated from the offence”, the Commissioner said. Odey promised that the state government will:
“clampdown on all illegal schools operated by people who don’t have the capacity to run schools in the State”, saying, “We will go after them, we will close them down because they don’t have the capacity to run schools”. He further said that in spite of the meagre allocation to the state, Governor Bassey Otu has approved the employment of about 6,000 teacher to assauge the shortage of teachers in the state, stating that his mission in the Cross River State Ministry of Education is to identify the perceived problems in the sector and profer solutions to them.
