A TEACHER'S DIARY : Anti-Bensouda demos at school

Being a deputy headmaster of any school is such a difficult job but being a male deputy under a female headmaster is another matter altogether! It is like having two jobs: one being the deputy HM and the other managing your boss.

I know of several deputies who have been transferred, interdicted, demoted or even sacked following differences with their female bosses. You see, female headmistresses think that the deputy does not respect her and is after her job. Plus they are petty. Very petty.

Were it not for my intellectual superiority, I would have encountered the same problems with Bensouda. When I was appointed HM, I had a long discussion with Juma, my predecessor who should never have held that position. I wanted to find out why he had been unceremoniously transferred.

“If you want to get in trouble with Bensouda, start asking questions about money,” he told me. “You can deal with school discipline and academics the way you want but when it comes to money, do not ask anything if you want peace,” he advised.

And that has been the case since I became her able deputy. Indeed, other than money matters, everyone knows that I am the headmaster of this school all along. I draw school programmes, timetable, I check teachers’ adherence to prescribed TSC teaching methodologies; and I ensure the school remains disciplined.

Occasionally Bensouda comes around, makes noise over some of these issues and then leaves. You will remember when we differed early in the year and she engineered my transfer replacing me with incompetent Kuya. Kuya left the running of the school to Bensouda, and was interested in knowing where the money from Free Primary Education fund went to. Before Kuya could say corruption, he had been hounded out of the office. And I was back!

Bensouda was happy to have me back. She could run her personal errands and not worry about the school. But last, Rasto, who was ousted as a BOM chairman last term asked to see me. Although he never considered me important when he was chairman, he sounded desperate.

“We miss you as chairman,” I told him when we met at Hitler’s. We were seated at the farthermost banana plantation, metres away from other revellers.

“I know,” he started. “Without me that school is going nowhere.” He then listed to me the development projects he had initiated and why he needed to remain as chairman to complete them.

“But why were you voted out?” I asked him.

“I wasn’t. Bendousa said that Matiang’i said that the chairman must be a Form Four leaver,” he said. “But we all know she wanted me out after I knew how she ate text books money.”

He then told me that they were organising demonstrations against her and they wanted my support. I wondered why I should support them. “It is your fight Rasto,” I told him. We were on the third drink, all at my cost.

“Wewe ni mjinga Andrea,” he said. “Kwani Bendousa akifutwa who will be the headmaster? You don’t want to be headmaster? Utakufa deputy?”

That was an exciting prospect, it was an idea whose time had come long ago but was only being postponed. If the demos could have Bensouda out, clearly, I would be the next headmaster. And I would run the school fully, including managing finances. Who wouldn’t want that?

I asked him what support they wanted from me. “We want you to tell us the day she will be in school, and some money.”

“Money for what?” I asked him.

“For mobilisation,” he said. “Some of the parents won’t come out for demos unless we give them something.” He wanted Sh1,200. It was not a lot of money considering what I stood to gain.

“There are two other things we want from you,” he said. “If bosses come here tell them you do not deal with funds and also can we have teachers on our side.” I agreed. “No teacher wants Bensouda in this school.