Teachers will be paid: Kombra

By JINA AMBA
SOME 10,000 teachers who were put off the payroll on pay number 10 will have their salaries paid, Education secretary Dr Uke Kombra says.
Dr Kombra told The National that Education Department had sent officers to all provinces last week to collect resumption forms.
“We hope to upload the collected (forms) for pay 10,” he said.
“We won’t know the numbers until the officers return.
Dr Kombra said those teachers that were teaching but due to the late submission of their resumptions, would be paid in full.
“They will get full back pay.
“The system automatically does that.
“Pay is driven by dates of resumption,” Dr Kombra said.
Earlier, Education Minister Jimmy Uguro said the 10,000 teachers had to be suspended from the Education Department payroll because their resumption-of-duty forms had not been received.
He said the forms were normally sent to the payroll section through the provincial education office at the start of each school year.
“Out of the 65,000 teachers around the country, only 10,000 are on auto-suspension,” he said.
“We are addressing this to ensure all teachers are on the payroll.
“It has been a tradition that after teachers are posted, new resumption of duty forms are completed for teachers to be on the payroll.”
The auto-suspension comes into force in March or April if the resumption of duty forms have not been received by the pay clerks.
“Teachers and provinces should comply with the requirements at the beginning of each year,” Uguro said.
“No teacher should give excuses.”
He said education officers would be sent to provinces to find out the cause of the delay in submitting forms.
They will also collect any outstanding form from the provincial education advisers.