More than 30,000
heads of primary and secondary schools will now be under the direct control of
the Education Cabinet Secretary.
On Wednesday,
Prof Jacob Kaimenyi gazetted the controversial Basic Education Regulations,
2014, despite opposition by the Commission for the Implementation of the
Constitution (CIC) and teachers’ unions.
The Kenya
National Union of Teachers (Knut) and the Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education
Teachers (Kuppet) were opposed to the regulations, arguing that they are
unconstitutional.
Prof Kaimenyi
will have powers to appoint the school heads as his agents. He will also have
the powers to sack them if they fail to perform. The heads will be accounting
officers and lead educators at their institutions.
The school heads
will also be team leaders in the implementation of the ministry’s policies and
programmes at the institutions they are in charge of.
In addition,
they will be the primary initiators of policy proposals for consideration by
county education boards and the Cabinet Secretary.
A head teacher
will serve for a term of five years, and will be eligible for reappointment for
a second and final third term. No individual will hold the position for more
than 15 years.
The regulations
also bar a person from serving in the position for more than two terms at the
same institution.
Those to be
appointed will have to be practising teachers registered with the Teachers
Service Commission (TSC). They can be serving quality assurance assessors.
INTERDICTED
They will also be
required to have served for at least 20 years, appointed as lead educators by
the TSC and undertaken at least a six-week course in education administration
or its equivalent in the past three years.
“Where the head
teacher or principal of the institution has been interdicted or dismissed by
the employer, the head teacher ceases to be the accounting officer for the
institution.
“The Cabinet
Secretary shall immediately appoint a replacement,” states the gazetted
regulations.
Last week, CIC
Chairman Charles Nyachae, in a letter to Knut and copied to Prof Kaimenyi,
warned that any purported publication of the proposed regulations before the
CIC, the Office of the Attorney-General and the Kenya Law Reform Commission
finalise reviewing them would be a violation of the Constitution.
“The proposed
regulations are subject to review by the CIC before publication in exercise of
the constitutional mandate under Section 5(6] of the Sixth Schedule to the
Constitution,” said Mr Nyachae.
According to
Knut Secretary-General Wilson Sossion, the gazetted rules will plunge the
education sector into a crisis. He warned of legal action.
“The union will fight to protect the gains made in the education sector,” said Mr Sossion.
“The union will fight to protect the gains made in the education sector,” said Mr Sossion.
According to
Prof Kaimenyi, the gazettement of the regulations will now operationalise the
Basic Education Act, 2013.
He said the
ministry has been involved in wide consultations on the operationalisation of
the law.
“We have spent a
considerable length of time discussing the regulations,” said Prof Kaimenyi.
There is also
the Basic Education (Amendment) Bill by Education Committee Vice-Chairman
Julius Melly that is before the National Assembly that seeks to give powers to
sponsors, who should be consulted by the TSC before appointing a person to head
their institutions.
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