St Gabriel’s Isongo school board urged to negotiate with TSC after teachers withdrawal

Mumias East deputy county commissioner Paul Lagat has said that the Board of Management (BOM) at Isongo Secondary School has the responsibility to negotiate with tge Teachers’ Service Commission (TSC) for new teachers to be posted.

Lagat said that all 17 teachers were transferred from the school for their security following the attack on the school principal David Wanjala last week.

“We have held meeting after meeting to try and come up with a way forward on what happened here in school last week. We’re aware that TSC has removed all teachers but we don’t know when others will be posted,” he said.

He said that his office would ensure security at the school.

“I was unable to provide security to teachers because information reached us when it was late,” he added.

He was addressing parents at the school after a day-long meeting by Mumias East subcounty director of education Boniface Ouko with BOM and PTA representatives Thursday.

He said an emergency meeting was held between the ministry, BOM, PTA and parents at the school.

What happened was not acceptable.

“Even if you’re offended there are laid down procedures on his to deal with the differences," he said.

He said that the 14 teachers employed by the board cannot manage the teaching tasks at the school.

“We will only resolve the problem at the school if all stakeholders work together. We don’t wish the school to close. We will deliberate with the board to come up with a way it will negotiate with TSC,” he said.

"We will follow up and investigate what happened here to ensure that the problem is sorted out."

Trouble at the school started on Thursday last week after parents of the school teamed up with bodaboda operators and forcefully ejected the school principal David Wafula.

The parents accused the principal of presiding over the drop in education standards.

They said that the mean score of the school was at 5.2 when he took over the school. They said the mean score dropped to 4.3 and finally 2.89 last year.

The school registered 179 candidates but only managed to produce two university entry grades, as the majority scored D- and four Es.