• His resentment has been bought about by vested interests and power struggles.
• Magoha cuts an image of a helpless boss, accuses his officers of dishonesty and scolds them for neglecting their duties.
Image: VICTOR IMBOTO
Six months after taking up the reins at the Education ministry, CS George Magoha seems to be a man under siege. He is no longer happy.
His resentment has been bought about by vested interests and power struggles that have led to disconnected working relations between him and some officers at Jogoo House. Yesterday, he made a noise that he is being frustrated in his efforts to reform the sector.
Magoha cut an image of a helpless boss, as he accused his officers of dishonesty and scolded them for neglecting their duties. He threatened to replace lazy officers if they fail to step up and improve services.
“If you are a director and you don’t do your work, you are a stupid fool... If you are not able to help me, then, unfortunately, I will have to replace all of you,” he said.
Early in the year when he took over from Amina Mohamed (now head of the Sports ministry), Magoha, a surgeon and former university boss, promised to transform the troubled sector.
His immediate mandate was to preside over the implementation of the contested competency-based curriculum, ensure 100 per cent transition to secondary school and save public universities from chocking on debts.
A confident and abrasive minister then promised to crush those who would stand in his way. His latest outburst is, however, a pointer that the promise could remain a pipe dream. The ministry is allegedly dogged by apathy.
“What is happening in my ministry is that there is a silo mentality about positions and ranking,” he said.
“This issue of positions and ranks need to end. We must work together. Junior officers are detached from the high ranking officers.”
Magoha spoke during the launch of the Sessional Paper no. 1 of 2019 that will guide the implementation of the new curriculum. The ministry unveiled the National Education Sector Plan 2018-22, which the CS said was long overdue.
The CS opened another battlefront with the Quality Assurance department, where, a few months ago, he carried out a major overhaul of senior staff, transferring them “for sleeping on their job”.
Head of the directorate Pius Mutisya was replaced with Mary Gaturu. Despite the changes, however, problems still abound, at least according to the CS. Magoha raised the alarm that the department is mired in corruption, which, he said, has led to irregularities such as allowing unregistered schools to operate.
“When you’ve not gone to inspect a school for six years, isn’t it fair to call you a thief because you are being paid to do nothing… What do you think we should do when we know you collect money to register the wrong schools?” the distraught CS asked.
A source from the directorate, however, told The Star on condition of anonymity that staff are overwhelmed.
“We have only 500 quality assurance officers who are supposed to ensure over 30,000 schools conform to the government requirement. This is a huge task for such a number of staff,” the source said.
Magoha said he has received complaints about his officers collecting bribes from parents to facilitate their children’s admission to some schools. “It’s very shameful when I’m given names of my officers on the ground collecting money to do things they are not meant to,” he said.
(Edited by F'Orieny)