THE BASIC EDUCATION PS MUST NO DOWNPLAY THE IMMENSITY OF CORRUPTION IN THE MINISTRY.

Dear Sir/Madam,

“Touch the raw fruit and you will be shown the ripe one” so goes a Bukusu dictum. It literally means that in the process of looking for information on culpability, the investigator(s) may inadvertently stumble upon something that may just propel a suspect to spill the beans. This is exactly what the public and the mainstream media has made Professor Karega Mutahi, the Basic Education PS to do. In a terse but revealing press release (Standard Newspaper, Monday 28th December 2009) titled “We remain steadfast to offering quality free education”, the jolly old Professor wonders loudly why the mainstream media and the public are collectively talking about the “wrong type of corruption in his ministry.”He convincingly reiterates that there is no scandal touching on the FPE.

He however, albeit reluctantly, admits to the existence of some mild form of corruption in other section(s) of the Kenya Education Sector Support Programme (KESSP), presumably in the capacity building component where an official reportedly misused 5.5 million shillings while about fifteen others are alleged to have forged receipts. This, the PS affirms, is the “correct type of corruption” docking in his ministry.

Any other type of corruption, according to the PS is at best, a figment of one`s imagination. That is why he is accusing the mainstream media and the public alike for either maligning him and the Minister for basic Education or deliberately misunderstanding a “mischievously leaked KESSP audit report.”However, this is in itself, the Belt away credence that the PS is himself “mischievously adapting the facts to fit the cause that he presently cares for; that of throwing the public and KACC off -balance from the goings- on in his ministry.

You see none other than the President himself ordered for investigations into allegations of possible misappropriation and embezzlement of the FPE funds. For the PS to come out guns blazing, at this point in time, is not only disrespectful of the President`s directive but also irresponsible as well as pre –judicial. It would increasingly appear as if the PS is hell- bent on being a permanent obstacle in KACC`s investigation; the more reasons why he must step aside.

Suffice to say that corruption whether in FPE (which is also a component of KESSP) or in other components of KESSP, directly jeopardizes the future of the Kenyan children. It therefore baffles many that a person of the stature of the PS appears to be downplaying the immensity of the criminal engagements in the Ministry. In so doing he risks being seen not only to be institutionalizing but also impiously buttressing the cancerous problem.

When he, characteristic of himself, adopts an aim of indifference by brazenly talking about a “mischievously leaked report” he is obviously trying to politicize the scandal yet this should be far from the case. Politicization of this issue will not by any chance sanitize the muck in the ministry.

Furthermore, the PS has not yet proved himself equal to the severe task of jealously guarding the resources of the public under his watch. This is because he is apparently oblivious of the avalanche of evidence on corruption currently surrounding KESSP`s vote head on Infrastructure Development and Procurement of Science Equipment in schools across the country. The evidence is there for all and sundry. For example, when some principals and head teachers in secondary and primary schools respectively learnt that KACC had hit the ground running, they, out of fear of incrimination, alleged that they were forced to play ball by corrupt officials from the Ministry of basic Education. At least one bold legislator from the larger Bungoma District is on record saying that he has written to the Ministry of Basic Education regarding this scandal.

It is an open secret that the selection of schools to benefit from this grant is not dependent on any transparently laid down criteria but on the affinity to corruption by the various school heads. The more corrupt a school head is the more “assistance” his or her school gets and so do kickbacks thrive.

With as little as ten percent of the total allocation per school, auditors from the ministry of basic education will give any school a clean Bill of health even though very little or none of the money will be used in the target project. So massive is the corruption tentacles that anyone who dares stand on its way is severely dealt with. I for instance, was at one time interdicted and suspended from service for writing to the PS to inform him of this cancerous corruption in schools.

This is how unashamedly officials at the Ministry`s Headquarters and corrupt Heads of schools connive to auction the future of the Kenyan children. Little of Infrastructure Development and Procurement of Equipment takes place in schools. Yet it is a fact that quality education can only be realized when schools have the necessary infrastructure and adequate science equipment to meet the rising demands of the curriculum.

The PS must know that it does not help to appear as though he thinks that the media and the public are a “pack of fools at the wrong place at the same time.” Rather, the PS needs to develop an Efficient Management Information System (EMIS) to run the ministry professionally so that he can secure the future of the Kenyan children and of course the future of the nation at large.

The PS more than anybody else must be worried of the recent startling research finding that states that more and more Kenyan people are more than likely to be dimwits in future. Corruption and mismanagement in the education sector more than anything else provides a fertile ground for the realization of this chilling scenario.

TOME FRANCIS,
BUMULA CONSTITUENCY.
http://twitter.com/tomefrancis