Widespread illegal and irregular levies in schools across the County have led head teachers and Secondary School Principals countrywide to adopt luxurious and arrogant lifestyles, parents and guardians in Embu County have alleged.
The parents claimed that principals in Embu County were acquiring properties at a rate of a drop of a hat, with many owning more than two palatial homesteads while they changed vehicles based on the homesteads they operated from within days of work.
Targeting one Principal over illegal levies, the parents warned, was an outright vendetta against a single school head against a background where illegal levies were so rampant that even class teachers and heads of departments frequently demanded money from learners and parents with impunity.
High and irregular levies at schools, the parents who spoke separately to The Education News Newspaper claimed, remained rampant right from the ECEDs to Secondary schools across all the Counties and complaints to the County Directors of Education went uninvestigated.
Led by James Njiru Kanjama, a guardian of three students from secondary schools in the Manyatta area, the parents said that intimidation by a majority of school management under various principals working with some favoured parents and guardians in a cross-section of the committee forced parents to remain silent.
The parents called for the formation of a National Investigations Committee to undertake investigations across all counties, with parents being interviewed separately just to reveal the shocking levels demanded by Principals operating in cohorts with compromised Parents and Teachers Associations (PTAs}
The Education Sector in Kenya, Mr Kanjama said, needed elaborate changes to avoid widespread anomalies easily allowed by the Teachers Service Commission and nearly all the County Education Directors who appeared to be benefitting from illegal levies.
Another parent, James Njuki from the Mbeere South area, suggested that any future investigations into illegal and irregular school levies should expand to include data on the financial operations of the Principals.
He suggested an investigation into the lifestyles of various school Principals and alleged that they enjoyed a life of luxury, with several homesteads clearly showing opulence.
Let us not target one principal of a particular school, levying of illegal fees and other charges remains evil and widespread, the Problem is that no audits are done, and some of the parents who sit in some management committees are highly compromised through allowances and other favours, said Mr Njuki.
A majority of Principals of schools in Embu, Mr Njuki said, have become so wealthy and arrogant and in fact, even got involved in business and commerce with the same school they managed, hence eroding the ethics required in the civil service.
He said that since hard cash started flowing into the hands of the Principals and head teachers, management of schools had gone to the dogs, and instead, most heads of schools were deeply involved in business and trade, with many even falling into commercial competition against one another.
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Parents and guardians expressed fears that most County Directors could be working with the corrupt Principals because, had the same directors been keen to eradicate or reduce the illegal levels, the same would not be rampant.
By Robert Nyagah
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