It is common knowledge that teachers are not happy after their strike failed to bear any fruit. The court awarded them a pay rise and the same court denied them the pay. Even their September salary has not been released yet.
The pain that this double blow inflicted on the teachers will not ease any time soon.
The loud cry from teachers at the moment is that the Government denied them their deserved pay. The bitter reality, however, is that teachers are their own enemies.
Firstly, it is teachers who facilitate civic education prior to elections. This is the time they enlighten the electorate on which kind of leaders to elect. Therefore, the political leaders we have is a direct product of the choice the electorate made based on civic education from teachers.
Secondly, teachers form a majority of presiding and returning officers, including the clerks at the polling stations. Given several cases of rigging reported, it goes without saying that teachers partake of bribes to facilitate rigging.
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Thirdly, teachers are the producers of all the educated men and women of any country. The question we should ask therefore is whether the teachers do a perfect job in making sure that they produce the best. At what point does that good and innocent student turn corrupt, disobedient, contemptuous, insensitive and all sorts of bad behaviour? Is it not while in the hands of their respective teachers? Should teachers now blame their very products for turning against them?
Since time immemorial, teachers have never voted as a bloc. In every election, all teachers recoil to their tribal cocoons under the guise of coalitions and vote on ethnic basis without regard to consequences of such kind of voting on their very profession.
Teachers are in the best position to evaluate and pick the best leaders in the land. If they can agree to vote as teachers for the best leaders, not only will they be happy but all Kenyans will be proud of their greatly resourceful country. This they can only manage if they remain professionals and resist the evil baits that come with campaigns.
