Kogi State Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Hon Wemi Jones has warned teachers against arriving late to school in the state.
Jones gave the warning when he led a team from the Ministry on an unscheduled Monitoring and Supervision of Crowther Memorial College Lokoja on Tuesday.
The commissioner who arrived the school premises at about 7:45 am, lamented why many of the teachers were yet to be in school as against the normal resumption time of 7:30 am.
The commissioner took the row call of the school teachers and discovered that majority of them had not resumed duty as at 8:20 am.
Jones, while addressing the teachers, warned that late coming and negligence to duty would no longer be tolerated henceforth in schools across the state.
The commissioner also decried that students who came late were much more than those students who arrived early because teachers themselves usually come late to school.
“Let me assure you that late coming and negligence to duty will definitely not continue in any of our schools in Kogi.
“This is the first school I am visiting since I was returned as Commissioner, and we are going to be closely monitoring and inspecting your activities,” Jones said.
The commissioner said that the government would create enough time to ensure that students get the right teachings and quality education they deserve.
He reassured that government would be making education totally free in Kogi by paying for so many things including all the internal and external exams.
He added: “We are going to create a system where Education becomes totally free, where pupils and students will not be charged anything.
“A system where the necessary tools and educational teaching and learning materials will be provided by Government through subvention.
“So, if the government is doing all of that and we did not owe you any salary, we cannot condone you not coming to teach our children no matter who you are.
“We have people who also passed the tests and interviews during the last teachers’ recruitment exercise, but due to the limited space we couldn’t take all of them, and they were put on the waiting list”.
Jones restated his determination to sustain schools’ monitoring and supervision from time to time, to ensure teachers’ punctuality and regularity to deliver quality education.
The commissioner commended the Old Students’ Association for the ongoing project being executed in the school to support government’s efforts in delivering quality education to the citizens of the state.
“As government, we will not shy away from our responsibilities in ensuring standard, order, and uniformity in everything that we will do.
“Government will still be focusing massively on education during the tenure of His Excellency, Alhaji. Ahmed Usman Ododo, ” he said.
Jones stressed that the staff of the ministry as well as himself would be doing intensive supervision and monitoring to ensure that the appropriate things were done in schools.
He, therefore solicited the cooperation and support of the teachers for government in its bid to make Kogi a shining example in education in northern Nigeria as well as the entire 36 States including the FCT.
The commissioner thereafter took his time to go round various classrooms to monitor the teachers while teaching the students.
The School’s Principal, Mr Maliki Baje Adinoyi, commended the commissioner and his team for their unscheduled visit to monitor their activities, saying it was a welcome development.
“I am very impressed by the impromptu inspection to our school by the commissioner and his team this early morning.
“This visit will ginger and boost the morale of both the staff and students to be punctual and take their work very seriously for effective performance,” Adinoyi said.
In the commissioner’s entourage were the Permanent Secretary, Mr Yakubu Dele Musa; the Public Relation Officer (PRO), Mr Solomon Musa; and some Directors in the ministry.
