Education Ministry under fire as lawmakers hand out job letters to new QUASOs
The Public Service Commission (PSC), which later sent the Quality Assurance and Standards Officers (QUASOs) to field offices under the Ministry of Education’s (MoE) command, has been questioned about its recruiting methods.
Education experts are worried that the MoE made over 110 illegal appointments of QUASOs between the middle of last year and the beginning of this year without conducting interviews or publishing job postings.
Those who were given the employment letters were understandably mostly teachers, and well-known politicians and powerful members of the administration handed them out.
The appointments and postings of the QUASOs to address the shortage of officers in the field were verified by a senior government official at the MoE, who could not be interviewed for fear of reprisal.
“The Ministry did, in fact, recruit the officers to remedy the scarcity of QUASOs in the area. Our sub-counties have openings in the officer corps that need to be filled. The officer said, “We, however, discovered that the number of individuals employed was extremely large.”
The senior officer, who has access to what’s going on at the MoE headquarters, acknowledged that the Government really did not post the positions or conduct interviews prior to the deployment of the aforementioned personnel.
“The Education CS is required by law to announce the vacancies and inform the Public Service Commission (PSC) to post the positions publicly, shortlist candidates, interview them, and appoint the officers by providing them with letters. The Ministry of Education insider stated that the government recruiting organization opted differently.
The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Authority (EACC) has been urged by those who are aware of these events to take immediate action and look into how the teachers were chosen and turned into QUASOs in violation of the official process.
Their assertions are based on allegations that between July 2024 and February of this year, MoE, through politicians and certain high-ranking government officials, surreptitiously sent appointment letters to teachers who were either their relatives or political buddies to join MoE as QUASOs.
To support the assertions, Education News carried out a fact-finding tour throughout many districts to see if police had just been hired as QUASOs.
According to the results, some teachers had been recruited to the QUASO division through the help of powerful political figures and governmental officials.
When the current officers in the QUASO docket under MoE discovered that some of the new recruits were purportedly assigned to higher positions than they were, it appears that they were very concerned about the alleged illegalities.
“Seeing politicians come in and oversee us in the field after fronting teachers from the class really damages our morale. The fact that there were no recent interviews or advertisements for the appointments only serves to lower our morale even more, said a senior QUASO from the Eastern area.
Additionally, it is claimed that several unnamed members of the Education Committee in Parliament were using the available (QUASOs) vacancies at the MoE to favor their friends and family.
“It is complete impunity for politicians to routinely ignore the law in order to benefit their followers, and it must be brought to an end. Such behavior demoralizes seasoned officers. The infuriated QUASO asked, “How do you foist inexperienced teachers and other recruits upon experienced officers, and how do you even have the audacity to hire them in higher job groups?”
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) has come under intense scrutiny recently after several Members of Parliament were caught handing out job application forms in their districts.
This is occurring at the same time that the Commission used a fair procedure to select instructors from among other Kenyans. The public had expressed doubts about the stringent testing process that others were subjected to, as opposed to the free job forms being given to those with good connections.
It’s important to note that despite not advertising officer vacancies for the previous four years, the MoE has continued to fill them. Earlier, the government declared a hiring halt in the civil service.
