Teachers at St. Paul’s Amukura High School in Busia County have become a dangerous menace that must be dealt with firmly and decisively once and for all to save the iconic institution from total collapse.
They have also become a dangerous liability not only to the students they are supposed to teach, but also the parents who only recently were forced to fork out a total of more than Kshs. 7 million after paying Kshs. 10, 000 each for the first strike last month.
According to sources, the teachers have misused the students to go on rampage for the second time on Monday night just like the first last month destroying school property worth hundreds of millions of shillings based on very flimsy reasons.
One of the stakeholders of the school, Justus Opakasi who spoke to Angaza News said: “These teachers have become dangerous liabilities who are engineering students to destroy school property which took parents and stakeholders decades to build and hundreds of millions of shillings.”
Speaking on behalf of the parents and stakeholders Mr. Opkasi said, they were demanding that this time round the government must deal firmly and decisively with the teachers to stop the once vibrant school from collapsing.
“We cannot continue forking out millions of shillings to pay for the damage engineered by the teachers who continue earning their full pay doing nothing while the students they engineered to go on destructive rampage are losing out at their parents’ homes without getting education the parents are paying fees for”, Opakasi said.
During the first strike last month the students destroyed dormitories, food store, laboratory and other properties worth millions of shillings after which they were sent home before doing their end of first term’s examinations.
Hardly two weeks after they had been re-admitted back to school they have again gone on rampage burning three dormitories and other school property worth millions of shillings.
Insider sources among the teaching fraternity told Angaza News that the teachers were not happy with their principal whom they are accusing of being mean in spending school money on what the teachers wanted him to do at their own whims.
They say that during the first strike the teachers took advantage of a one day delay by the principal to buy bread for students after the Busia County Governor Sospeter Ojaamong gave out Kshs. 12, 000 for that purpose, but the bread was bought a day later and not the day the cash was given out.
The source confirmed to Angaza News that the former Bungoma County Governor and the Speaker of the Senate Ken Lusaka from the neighbouring Bungoma County had previously also gave out Kshs, 10, 000 to buy the students bread which was instead diverted to buying of a new Television set something that didn’t go down well with a section of the students.
The insider source said: “This time round the whole plot was hatched at Kolanya High School after the school’s football team lost the game which the Amukura teachers bitterly contested, but their principal asked them to calm down and go back to Amukura as losing was not the end of another chance for the school to compete in future games.”
Apart from that the sources say that the teachers were not happy with the way their principal was strict when it comes to releasing money to teachers, particularly those heading extra-curricular clubs like Soccer, Athletics, Drama, and Debate among others to take their teams out to attend contests.
They told Angaza News that the bottom line is the fact that the aggrieved teachers are “eating” from the monies that are given to take out students to attend these activities by bloating up their budgets and pocketing the rest and that is the genesis of their acrimony with their principal.
The worst aspect of the whole business apart from the devastating destruction the students are wreaking on the school is the adverse impact it is having on the school’s performance in national examinations and the annual student enrolment.
St. Paul’s Amukura High School is one of the oldest and most highly respected educational institutions in Busia County. Indeed for many decades it was the leading and considered the Alliance High School of the county where every pupil leaving primary school wanted to go for secondary and high school education.
The institution has produced some of the most prominent personalities not only from within the county but also from outside beginning with the Busia Counter Governor Sospeter Ojaamong and many other professionals.
However, over the recent years the High School’s fortunes have been dwindling with today an estimated student population of only 700 when previous non-entities like Nambale High School have more than 1000 students with many wanting to join it being turned away.
Apart from the mess being caused by the teachers, there is also the critical question of tribalism that has doggedly followed it over the decades, whereas the local Teso community are averse to embracing people from other communities, especially in heading the institution and that outs it in a vicious box.
