The abuse of TFF funding

Much has been said about the lack audit of tuition fee free funds by the Education Department and the financial mismanagement of school funds by principals and school boards who take advantage of the lack of oversight to misuse the money. In many cases, players in the education system at the national, provincial and district levels are assumed to be linked to the deliberate abuse of the TFF

funds. The government is spending millions on schools every year and therefore expects school principals and school governing bodies to manage the money well.
However, the failure by both the provincial and national departments of education to audit the TFF funds periodically has encouraged school principals and boards to walk away with thousands of kina without a trace.
Few primary school principals in the Highlands – both at elementary and primary levels – are using these funds to buy vehicles and or pay for the construction of high covenant buildings. There are stories in the Highlands of school principals venturing into small business like bookshops or buying mini buses or having polygamous relationships (some even with the girls they are teaching), all in the name of unaccounted TFF funds.
The weak enforcement of existing legislative frameworks and a lack of proper monitoring and control systems by the Department of Education are allowing school officials to ignore regulatory procedures and the effective and efficient management of school finances.
The failure by the Government to enforce tough financial audit requirements in schools is allowing corrupt principals, board members and even education officers to misuse use the TFF funds.
It is costing the country millions.
This is a wake-up call for the current Government to intervene and stop corrupt school officials from using the TFF funds for their own personal benefit.
The abuse of school funds is especially rife at schools in remote areas.
Some Highlands areas are so remote that the schools are closed for most of the year, yet the TFF funds are still being received and the teachers are still being paid.
In some cases the teachers bribe district education officers with pigs or money to entice them to falsify data to make it appear that the school is active and the teachers are at work every day.
When education officers collude with headmasters, it is very difficult for people in the community to report corruption because the corrupt deals are being engineered by the very person in authority at district or provincial levels who will receive the complaints. It is even possible for the education department to believe that the teacher is still at work, and getting paid through the bank, when in fact the teacher is no longer living at the school or in the area.
In one case it was said that in Kagua-Erave, members of a school board fought at the market because the teacher in charge of the school was accused of using TFF funds to buy himself a secondhand bus to operate as a business.
These things are happening.
The national Government should regularly audit schools to make sure they are holding classes, that all the teachers are at work everyday and the TFF money is being used for what it was meant for.
It seems that in our country, the education system does not follow any rules of accountability and no one is held accountable or responsible for the running of schools.
School boards, principals and education officers should be made to demonstrate accountability as a means to ensuring that internal education policies and procedures are lawful and reflect the best interests of its stakeholders, parents, school children and the country at large.
At the end of the day, accountability requires compliance with laws and regulations, record keeping, reporting, auditing and oversight as essential ingredients of the government but the failure to implement the appropriate duty of care results in thousands of unaccounted TFF funds being abused by elementary and primary school teachers.
Over to you, Education Department.

Kende Kiripe
Yaporolo Weki