104 TEACHERS AWOL, BUT STILL RECEIVE SALARIES

MBABANE – Government has launched an investigation into the whereabouts of 104 teachers who are continuing to receive salaries despite that they are not located at their workstations. This anomaly was uncovered during the rightsizing exercise which has been recently conducted by government through the Ministry of Public Service. The whereabouts of the teachers is said to be unknown to the employer.

The Ministry of Education and Training has since issued a list of the teachers following the redeploying of teachers after reports of overstaffing in some schools. This follows an exercise where the Teaching Services Commission (TSC) and Regional Education Officers had followed up on allegations that there was overstaffing in certain schools. A statement issued by the Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Education and Training, Bhekithemba Gama, said the 104 teachers should come to the ministry tomorrow carrying their posting letters assigning them to the schools they were currently posted at.

Revealed

In the list, 60 teachers were said to be from the Hhohho Region while 14 were from the Lubombo Region. Also, the list revealed that there were six from the Manzini Region while 25 were educators from the Shiselweni Region. Under Secretary Schools Manager in the Ministry of Education, Lungelo Nhlengetfwa, informed this publication that the ministry had paid visits to various schools and discovered that supervisors of these teachers were unaware of their whereabouts.

He said independent investigations had led to the ministry establishing that some of the teachers had migrated abroad to countries like the Republic of China (Taiwan). “The challenge is that they are still drawing a salary from government despite not being where they were initially posted. We want to be able to locate those who were transferred and or redeployed,” he said. Nhlengetfwa said on the issue of those who had migrated and had not tendered resignations and as such, were still drawing a salary, their matter would be transferred to the Legal Department in an effort to recover the taxpayers’ money.

Meanwhile, TSC Chairperson Dr Amos Mahlalela, in a previous interview, said this meant that teachers were doing less work than they were supposed to be doing. Dr Mahlalela said they had addressed this with the Ministry of Education and Training to arrest overstaffing through rightsizing. At the launch of the exercise, Dr Mahlalela said this meant that there would be movement and shifting of teachers to address the overstaffing. He further explained that there had been a programme by the ministry in yesteryears to address the issue of ‘ghost’ teachers.

These, he explained, were teachers who were remunerated by government despite that they were not present at their duty stations. This, it was said, was in line with identifying ghost teachers and ensuring that there was quality education in schools. It was also explained that the ratio of teacher to pupil in primary is 1:40 while in high school is 1:30. It is worth noting that the call by the Owen Nxumalo-led Ministry of Education and Training is against the backdrop of the Auditor General, Timothy Matsebula, reporting that government is plagued by ghost employees and over E1.2 million salaries are unaccounted for at the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC).

In his findings, AG Matsebula reported that salaries amounting to E1 293 045 from Responsibility Centres 1201 item 01299 for the financial year ended  March 31, 2024 were paid by the EBC without the necessary supporting documents. According to Section 14 of the Public Finance Management Act (2017), the head of Finance function in a ministry shall, (b) maintain full and proper accounts, (c) provide accounting and reporting information for internal and external purposes, including preparing the periodic and annual reports and accounts.

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