Unpaid teachers arrears cited as reason for shoddy performance

 Education stakeholders in Mwanza region have expressed their concerns that poor performance in primary schools was caused by government failure to pay teachers a total of Sh150 million arrears. Tanzania Teachers’ Union chairman Mr Sibora Kisheri said, the arrears had negatively impacted on teachers’ accountability. Mr Kisheri revealed that the arrears were due to the outstanding unpaid allowances, transfer grants, medical treatment and holidays allowances since 2016, to mention but few.

For her part, Magu District Commissioner Khadija Nyembo called for fresh assessment to identify the cause of the arrears.

She urged the teachers in the region not to take delayed payment of their arrears as a reason for not performing their duties, disclosing that the challenge had contributed a lot to poor performance in primary schools for three years in a row.

Meanwhile, Mwanza regional education officer Michael Lugola revealed that the performance in primary schools in the region had dropped from third in 2015 to eighth place this year in national examinations.

Commenting on the matter, the Mwanza regional administrative secretary, Mr Clowding Mtweve assured that his office has already contacted the president’s office regional administration and local government over the teachers arrears and urged the teachers to continue performing their duties normally as his office works on the matter.

In addition, Mwanza regional commissioner Mr John Mongella condemned teachers’ move to fail exercising their duties in an attempt to convince the government to pay the arrears, urging the teachers to fully engage in teaching.