FCTA approves N7bn for primary school teachers’ salaries

Dr Danlami Hayyo, the Secretary for Education, Federal Capital Territory Administration, says N7 billion has been approved to offset 25 per cent of the outstanding arrears of salaries of teachers in public primary schools.

Hayyo said this during a familiarisation visit to the management of the FCT Universal Basic Education Board on Thursday in Abuja.

He said the FCTA would pay 40 per cent of the outstanding arrears while the Area Councils pay 60 per cent.

He also said the Administration had directed the Area Councils to pay the money within three months likewise FCT, adding that the money would be deducted from the source and sent to them.

The Education Secretary said this was to ensure that the teachers went back to the classrooms.

He affirmed that FCT UBEB was a key agency in the Administration, and has proven its commitment to the core mandate of ensuring that every child of school age in the Territory was given access to school.

He said that the Board with over 1000 schools still suffers from shortage of teachers.

Hayyo, however, said that the administration was studying the challenges with a view to finding a solution to it.

“The essence of this visit is to see how the secretariat can collaborate with the Board towards achieving its mandate.

“I am thankful to God that the Board has counterpart funding in addition to the BESDA account.

“I promise that the available resources from UBEC and UBEB will be used to address the challenges,” Hayyo said.

He said that the Secretariat would ensure the take-off of Karshi Model School adding that maximum support would be given to Karshi and Korea Model schools to showcase FCT to the world.

Hayyo said that when the FCT Minister finally approves the recruitment of teachers, the method of recruitment would be based on Area Councils.

According to him, one cannot be from Bwari and apply for a teaching appointment in Kuje, this will reduce the issue of lack of teachers and complaints of insecurity in some of the schools.

Earlier in his welcome address, the Acting Executive Chairman of FCT Universal Basic Education, Dr Alhassan Sule, told the Education Secretary that the board has nine departments and four critical units.

Sule said girl child education was promoted through the establishment of Ako Girls’ Secondary School in addition to the board’s special schools amongst others.

He informed the Education Secretary of how the Board was partnering with NGOs to develop schools in the FCT.

He enumerated the challenges facing the Board to include lack of vehicles for Directors to discharge their duties more effectively and increasing population which was overstretching education facilities in the territory.