Teachers reject new push to make principals accounting officers for school resources

Kenya Secondary Schools Head Teachers Association Chairman John Awiti (left) with a colleague.

NAIROBI, KENYA: Teachers and their employer have opposed a proposal by the Ministry of Education to have secondary school principals act as the ministry’s accounting officers.

At the centre of the controversy is the proposal by the ministry to issue all secondary school heads with agency letters under the new operational guidelines for Boards of Management (BoM). This means that as agents of the ministry, school principals will now be accounting officers for the Ministry of Education.

President Uhuru Kenyatta, in a speech read recently on his behalf by Labour Cabinet Secretary Kazungu Kambi, had said secondary school principals should take full responsibility for the resources they manage.

Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang had also noted that school heads manage huge resources that must be accounted for. The principals, however, rejected the proposal and termed it “unnecessary” as they were already employed by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC).

Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (Kessha) National Chairman John Awiti said the law provides that all principals become the secretary to the BoM but opposed the move to make them accounting officers for the ministry.

“We are already employees of TSC. If the ministry also wants us to be their accounting officers, then we are facing a serious conflict,” he said.

Awiti said principals are against the appointments even as Dr Kipsang said the regulations will be subjected to discussion by stakeholders before adoption. “We are streamlining management to ensure resources are taken care of. As at now, that decision has not been made,” said Kipsang.

When contacted, TSC Secretary Gabriel Lengoiboni declined to comment on the raging controversy.

Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) Secretary General Wilson Sossion said the regulations “will only pass over our dead bodies”.

The new regulations under Section 6.1.2 read: “The Principal Secretary shall issue a letter of appointment as accounting officer of each head of basic education institution in line with the Basic Education Act No.14 of 2013 and the Fourth Schedule Section.”

Section 6.1.1 also reads: “Once the Cabinet Secretary receives the letter of confirmation of appointment and inauguration of the BoM from the County Education Board, the BoM shall be issued with a letter of agency mandating it to manage all financial, human and physical resources in the school as a delegated function.

Monday, Awiti said the arrangement is a recipe for chaos.

“We foresee a situation where when the ministry terminates the services of a principal but the TSC is not aware, he may be in charge of a school but cannot be accountable,” he said.

He said it would also be possible that when the teachers’ employer fires a principal and the ministry is not aware, schools may have accounting officers who are not employed by TSC.

“We want the ministry and TSC to sit down and agree on how to harmonise these issues to avoid conflicts,” said Awiti. “If there is any misunderstanding between the two offices, the principals should not be party to that,” he said.

The principals also recommended that the composition of BoMs be revised to nine, down from 17.

“When there are many people in a committee and decisions have to be made, they drag for so long. We therefore request that these BoM members be reduced to nine,” they said.