Pupils and students in Oyo state were recently returned to archaism when questions were written for them to copy and answer from chalkboards during the last term’s examinations. In a response to the public outcries against the retrogression in education in the state, the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), Oyo state chapter was quoted to have alleged that Governor Seyi Makinde failed to give running grants spanning two terms to schools in the state.
In a swift reaction, Governor Seyi Makinde, during the mega Christmas event organized by the state government at Agodi, took a swipe at NUT for making lies and half truths over the issue of running grants to schools. The Governor countered their allegation, telling NUT that its members refused to render accounts of the running grants they received from the government during last session.
It’s a sad development that issues of administration and bureaucracy have become a subject of brickbats between the governor and his teachers. It’s also an indictment on the administrative competence of Governor Seyi Makinde. The governor appeared to have made the counter allegation against the heads of schools to bamboozle them into silence. When did Governor Makinde realise that the school heads do not account for running grants they receive from the state government since he had been giving them running grants since he assumed office almost two years ago? It means that Governor Makinde has been allowing the school heads to go away with corruption.
One salient error the governor made is to assume that accountability is automatic once monies have been disbursed. An experienced manager of men would understand that humans are naturally lawless and they thrive under disorderliness. Unless mechanisms of control and regulation are put in place, humans would go about their activities with reckless abandon. We may well ask Governor Makinde what measures of accountability he entrenched to control the disbursement of running grants to schools! The revelation about non accountability of school heads over the running grants they collect is, unarguably, a reflection of the porous way ministries, departments and agencies in Oyo state are being administered.
It’s difficult not to believe that Governor Makinde’s outbursts against NUT is a design to cover up his inadequacy as regards non payment of running grants to schools. Is this how Governor Makinde ran Makon Engineering without entrenching mechanisms of control and regulation to engender accountability and transparency?
On the part of NUT, people may blame the governor for not subjecting its members to the bureaucracy of accountability. But NUT as a union must impress it upon its members to make accountability their watchword. If corruption is not running in one’s vein, one does not need any prompting to give account of what one is entrusted with, especially if it has to do with funds and finances. Since wrapper and scarf are usually sewn from same material, (irú ìró nìborùn), the incorruptibility of the body of executives of NUT is questionable since members who become executives are picked from teachers who seem to have aversion for accountability.
If Governor Seyi Makinde had been proactive in creating an avenue for rendering accountability in the disbursement of running grants, and if the school heads had come to the equity of spending running grants with clean hands, Oyo pupils and students would have been saved the barbarism and the embarrassment of copying exam questions from chalkboards.
