ASCSN faults FG’s non-promotion of education ministry officers

The Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN) has faulted the recent promotional exercise carried out across various Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) in the country.

The association noted that just a few officers were promoted to the directorate level in the Education Ministry when compared to others.

It said that in the entire Federal Ministry of Education which has more than 6,000 staff in all states of the federation, only 70 officers were promoted to the directorate level.

A statement signed by the ASCSN National President, Shehu Mohammed and Secretary-General, Joshua Apebo, pointed out that only three Deputy Directors were elevated to the rank of Directors, 14 Assistant Directors were promoted to Deputy Directors while 53 officers were uplifted to the rank of Assistant Directors making a total of 70 officers that benefitted from the promotion exercise, which cuts across the Headquarters of the Federal Ministry of Education, the 110 Federal Government Colleges (FGCs) and the Federal Education Quality Assurance Service (FEQAS).

According to ASCSN, when compared with 356 officers who were elevated to the directorate level in the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (OHCSF), 286 benefitted the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF), and 102 in the Ministry of Police Affairs, among others, show that officers in the Federal Ministry of Education, with only 70 elevated to the directorate level, were shortchanged.

The move for not creating opportunities for education officers in the Federal Ministry of Education to reach the height of their career by rising to the directorate level, the union said, may dampen their morale through stagnation.

The union urged the presidency, Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Federal Civil Service Commission, and the OHCSF to intervene on the matter and ensure that education officers in the headquarters of the Federal Ministry of Education, those in the 110 FGCs, and the FEQAS throughout the federation are promoted as and when due, like their counterparts in other MDAs, in the interest of justice, equity, and fairness, while its recommendations are also implemented to boost the morale of staff.

The union stressed how it has proposed several times to the management of the Ministry of Education that the junior arms of the Federal Government Colleges should be disarticulated from the senior secondary segments, as has been done in Lagos and Kano states and the FCT, thereby creating more vacancies for directors to head each school.

It also recommended that tenure policy must continue to be implemented in the Federal Ministry of Education so that vacancies at the directorate level could continue to be generated while big units in the Ministry, such as the Nigeria Education Management Information System (NEMIS) and NATCOM for UNESCO, could also become departments to be manned by directors.

Among other recommendations, the labour leaders suggested that education attachés should be reintroduced in foreign missions, education desks created in MDAs, mentorship programmes for directors on elongation introduced, while a three-year tenure system for principals of Unity Schools, as agreed with the union, should be implemented.

The union stressed the need for adequate funding of departments while there should be presidential waivers for the Federal Ministry of Education to create vacancies as it was done in 2013 so that stagnated officers could be promoted.

“We believe that if these recommendations are implemented in the Federal Ministry of Education, there will be enough vacancies for senior civil servants to continue to rise to the directorate level,” they said.