NUT Tells Teachers Not To Take Part In The Kaduna Govt’s Competency Test 

The Nigeria Union of Teachers’ (NUT) National Executive Council (NEC) has instructed its members in Kaduna State not to take part in the state government’s competency test.

News Agency of Nigeria

Mr Kelvin Nwankwo, the union’s Deputy National President, issued the directive during a meeting with teachers in Kaduna on Wednesday.

The union issued the directive in response to the Kaduna State Government’s plans to conduct competency tests for public primary school teachers in December, according to Nwankwo.

According to the Nigerian News Agency (NAN), the Kaduna State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) announced plans in July to conduct competency tests for primary school teachers in order to ensure quality instruction.

The competency test, according to Dr. Christy Alademerin, Permanent Member, Human Resource Management, Kaduna SUBEB, was designed to ensure that the state had “the best of the best.”

“We are going to conduct the competency test to either weed out incompetent ones or whatever the outcome will look like, just to maintain the standards,” she said.

In response to the development, the union’s state wing issued a statement on Aug. 18 declaring that none of its members in public primary schools would take the test.

The union’s NEC, according to the deputy national president, was behind the Kaduna state wing’s decision.

He insisted that the teachers’ qualifications had been established by a number of accredited universities and colleges of education, and that they had also been tested before being hired.

The NUT, he claims, affirms and relies on the provisions of Section 1(d) of the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) Act, CAP.T3 LFN 2004, which regulates and regulates the teaching profession.

“As teachers who belong to a professional body, registered and licensed, we shall only subject ourselves to any professional recommendation issued by our Regulatory Council, but no other body.

“The NEC had unequivocally resolved that no teacher should be subjected to any form of competency test under any guise or colouration but advised that issues of quality education should be pursued vigorously by the state government and teachers at all levels and at all times,” he said.

He advised state governments to implement a mandatory continuous training program, similar to what is done in nursing, medicine, and the legal profession.

He went on to say that the teachers were willing to participate in refresher courses, workshops, seminars, or training to fill knowledge gaps in their various fields of expertise.

“However, we are opposed to any political ploy aimed at easing teachers out of service, with the pretext that such teachers had failed examinations,” he said.

Mr Ibrahim Dalhatu, the State Chairman, also emphasized that only TRCN was legally authorized to conduct any type of teacher competency test, and that teachers would refuse to take any test conducted by any other body.

According to NAN, the state government fired 21,780 primary school teachers in January 2018 after they failed a competency test in 2017 and hired 25,000 qualified ones.