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On the night of December 3, 2023, Nigerian military drones “mistakenly” attacked a village called Tundun Biri in Kaduna State. This horrible incident in which the Nigerian Army bombed civilians isn’t the biggest news in the country right now. But it should be, so we took it upon ourselves to compile everything to know about it.
An Eid-el-Maulud celebration
It all started when locals of Tundun Biri village came together to celebrate the birth of the Holy Prophet Muhammad. According to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) North-West Zonal Office, the bombing started around 9 p.m. Observers recounted that the first bomb ended over 30 lives on the spot. As people raced to help the injured and dead, a jet dropped another bomb.
Image source: X.com
The death count
As of December 5, NEMA has the official death count at 85, with 66 injured and receiving treatment at the Barau Dikko Hospital. However, an anonymous officer revealed that the army received at least 126 dead civilian bodies.
Tinubu speaks
President Bola Tinubu is currently at the COP28 Climate Summit in Dubai, but he conveyed his condolences through his spokesperson, Ajuri Ngelale, condemning the drone attack. He also called for a thorough investigation into the “bombing mishap”.
The Nigerian Army’s response
The General Officer, Commanding 1 Division of the Nigerian Army, Major-General Valentine Okoro, admitted that the attack came from the Nigerian Army. As the commander of the division that caused the mishap, Okoro gave a statement to Samuel Aruwan, Kaduna’s Commissioner of Internal Security and Home Affairs. Apparently, it was an error made while the drone operators were on a routine mission against terrorists. The Army spokesman, Brigadier General Onyema Nwachukwu, said the aerial patrol troops mistook the celebration for terrorist activities.
Image source: X.com
On December 5, the Nigerian Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lieutenant General Taoreed Lagbaja, visited the village to commiserate with the families of the deceased and apologise to the village. He also promised to cover the hospital bills. But who will answer for the bombing of these innocent people?
CAN, Amnesty International and other NGOs
The Kaduna chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Amnesty International, Arewa Youth Consultative Forum (AYCF), among other non-govermental organisations, have condemned the military’s mishit. The chairman of the CAN Kaduna chapter, Reverend John Hayab, said they’ll continue to pray for the government, while the AYCF National President, Shettima Yerima, charged the government to launch an investigation.
Not the first bombing mishaps
In 2023, there have been three bombing mishap cases. The first happened in Niger State on January 24. The second killed over 40 herders in Nasarawa State two days later. According to research, at least 425 Nigerians have perished due to military “error” bombing between 2017 and 2023.
The Nigerian Air Force denies involvement
Although the Nigerian Air Force is behind the first two cases of bombing civilians by mistake this year, it quickly disassociated itself from the Tundun Biri incident. On Monday, December 4, the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) released a statement through its Director of Public Relations and Information, Air Commodore Edward Gabkwet. According to him, NAF had nothing to do with the attack and hadn’t operated in the state or its surroundings in a while. “The NAF is not the only organisation operating combat-armed drones in the Northwestern region of Nigeria.”
Citizens protest
On December 7, protesters marched to the National Assembly and demanded the immediate resignation of Badaru Abubakar, the Minister of Defence. In Zaria Local Government Area, Kaduna State, a group of youths took to the streets to protest the brutal bombing.
The former governor of Kaduna state, Nasir El-Rufai, is in the news. Social media users have been critiquing his comments during the week regarding his state’s governorship election. Uba Sani of the All Progressives Congress (APC) was declared the winner by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in a tightly fought election. El-Rufai spoke about his party leveraging Islamic religious sentiments to give Sani victory at the polls.
El-Rufai was addressing Muslim clerics in Kaduna at an event where he was handing over to Sani. The speech, which was in Hausa, has been transcribed by Premium Times. Here’s the transcript below:
Transcript
“Why did I pick Dr Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe as my deputy in 2019? First, I calculated that most of those, not Muslims, don’t vote for our party. Most of them. So, why should I give them the deputy (governor) position? I did my calculation, and I knew we could win the election without giving them (the position of deputy governor). That’s first. That’s a purely political issue. It’s politics. You want to win an election and seek people to vote for you. We have observed that since we started practising democracy, we know places we used to win elections and those places we don’t. We’ve done that calculation politically. That’s the political point of it.
Secondly, what we wanted to prove to people, and thank God in the last four years, we’ve vindicated ourselves and proved that a government that has a Muslim as governor, a Muslim as deputy governor, a Muslim as SSG (secretary of state government), a Muslim as chief of staff, a Muslim as finance commissioner, we’ll not cheat Christians in Kaduna State. And everywhere we go, we tell them, Yes, that’s it; the top government hierarchy in Kaduna State are Muslims, but can any Christian in Kaduna prove that we’ve oppressed them? Is there any district that we didn’t renovate schools? Is there any district we didn’t construct a hospital? Anywhere that we didn’t build roads? Is there anywhere we didn’t help farmers, whether they voted for us? We’ve given everyone their entitlements.
Of course, Kubau (Local Government Area) voted for us the most (in Northern Kaduna), so I’ll add something to Kubau because they voted for us. What I’ll give Jaba, I’ll increase it for Kubau because Jaba didn’t vote for us. But we’ve given them their entitlements.
You, Imams and Ulamas, taught us that leadership in Islam is all about justice. The Prophet (peace be upon him) and his companions lived with those that were not Muslims, including Jews, Christians and even pagans, but they addressed him as El-Amin (trusted one) because he treated them with fairness. Caliphs like Abubakar, Umar, Usman, and Ali did justice to those who were not Muslims. Nobody can say he was oppressed for not being a Muslim. But you’ll prefer the ones who support you. But don’t oppress any.
I always tell them. During this campaign season, they said “this and that,” and I replied ‘Yes, we’re looking for those who can deliver. We’re not looking at your religion. Of course, we consider the religious aspect, but I can’t say that. But what I am saying is, who is being oppressed? Open up and tell us if this government has treated you unjustly. No answer. Well, no one can say he is used to being engaged in criminal activities, used to being idle, but we stopped that. Or you were used to blocking the road, and we said if you do it again, this will be the consequences, and you know we can do it.
That’s what we’ve done for four years, myself and my team. And that’s what we still did, and Senator Uba Sani and Dr Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe still won their election (as governor and deputy) even with the religious gang up against us. You, the Imams and Ulamas here, were the ones who did the work, not even the politicians, because the politicians even betrayed us. And he, Senator Uba Sani, knows this. We know it. We’re aware of those who collected money on election day but switched off their phones, slept off and didn’t even bother to come out for the election. But we know the First Aid group members that served as polling agents.
Those we paid to protect the votes didn’t do so, but the first aid group members did. And we’re grateful for that, and may God reward you and how you dedicated yourself and supported us. In the name of God, I beg you to support Senator Uba Sani when he finishes his first four years. Re-elect him into office. Then we can continue to prove to people that Islamic leadership doesn’t discriminate but doesn’t condone deliberate mocking. It doesn’t condone indignity. That’s the only thing we want to prove, and we’ve started, but this is not the end; we’ll have to do it for at least twenty years, which will make everyone understand.
After Uba finishes his tenure and gets re-elected, that’ll be sixteen, right? (El Rufai served two terms of eight years as governor). Then we’ll have another tenure which will make it 24 years. That is when everyone will understand and say, ‘Okay, we understand, we know our status, and we know the Muslims will not oppress us.’ That’s it. And you’ll see that there will be peace. I swear to God, this has been our plan from the first day we started APC in the state, and God has been helping us with your prayers and commitment. We’re on the right path. May God bless you all.”
The topic of how young Nigerians navigate romantic relationships with their earnings is a minefield of hot takes. In Love Currency, we get into what relationships across income brackets look like in different Nigerian cities.
Image Source: Unsplash (Actual subjects are anonymous)
Folake* (27) met her partner, Ezra* (26) during their NYSC in Kaduna, and they bonded over their knowledge of God and shared birthdays. In this article, she tells Zikoko about their initial fake relationship, celebrating their birthdays together, and how they plan to finance their upcoming wedding.
What was the first gift your partner gave you?
Bread. It was on Valentine’s Day in 2019. He’d asked me what I wanted, and I told him that I was fine. But I also added that he could get me bread if he really wanted to buy me something. He got it and added a happy Valentine’s Day note.
LMAO. But why didn’t you want a gift?
I didn’t see the need. Even though we pretended to be dating, we were really just platonic friends. It started a month after we met. One of his roommates was trying to hit on me, but I wasn’t interested. And since people had already started to speculate Ezra and I were dating because of our closeness, we started to call each other “baby”.
Fair enough. How did you meet him?
After NYSC camp in December 2018, I moved into the NYSC accommodation in January 2019. I only talked to my roommates and barely knew anyone else because I was always indoors reading. One day, a roommate dragged me along to one of the rooms she went to chill. That’s where I met Ezra and his roommates. I became friends with them, but I was closer to Ezra.
Why?
We used to gist about God. Our ideologies aligned on most issues, and then I found out we had the same birthday. He was also trying to build me up to succeed him as Prayer Secretary in our fellowship when he passed out. He was in Batch A while I was in C.
Did you?
No. They made me female co-ordinator instead. He must’ve figured I was nervous about this because it was a higher position, so he asked us to do a prayer walk.
At what point did the relationship move from platonic?
April 2019. He started his master’s degree immediately after finishing his NYSC, so he moved to the MSc hostel in a different area.
Not long after, one of his roommates came to complain to me that it seemed Ezra had forgotten them, and I decided to call him. The call started with me accusing him of forgetting me, and sometime during the four hours of conversation that followed, I told him I loved him.
How did he react?
He asked if I was giving him permission to pray about us now because I had always warned him against falling in love with me, saying I wasn’t interested in a relationship during NYSC year. I agreed and said I would do the same on my end.
He returned with the word, “He who finds a wife has found a good thing, ” and he asked me to date him. I told him to send a mail first.
Wahala
It wasn’t until June 2020 before I gave him an answer.
It took over a year?
I knew all about NYSC relationships — they’d start during the year and end when service ended. So I wanted to finish NYSC first, and I also wanted to tell my uncle and pastor about it because I was a little reluctant due to our age difference. I’m a year older.
Have you had to talk to them about other boyfriends?
This was the first time I was sure about someone, and I wanted them to have a say. Getting their approval reassured me, and some days after, I excitedly called him to check his mail because I had responded to that question.
Did anything change?
Nothing. He already used to send morning and evening text messages, so we continued. He surprised me on our birthday that year, though.
How come?
He had a job interview in Lagos that month. But I didn’t know he had come earlier and planned with my uncle to show up at the beach hangout my family and a few friends organised to celebrate my birthday. When Ezra arrived, my uncle made up an excuse about leaving and asked us to close our eyes as he prayed. During the prayers, Ezra slipped behind me and notified me of his presence. It was one of my best birthdays ever.
How did you celebrate birthdays after that?
Usually, we go to church and then go out after. I buy the cake while he pays for the outing. The cake is usually about ₦15k. In 2021, I got two cakes which were ₦25k.
What about gifts?
I often don’t get him birthday gifts because I don’t have the money. But on Valentine’s Day this year, I got him a cake and mocktails package I saw online for ₦10k.
I also get him gifts on random occasions. I’ve gotten him adire fabric twice; they cost ₦8k. I recently got him a man purse and a journal he was very excited about. Both cost ₦5k and ₦4k, respectively.
Is he still in Kaduna?
No. He got a job in Lagos at the end of last year, so he moved. Now, he’s another reason for me to visit Lagos. He also tries to come to Kaduna to see me. He proposed during one of such trips in April 2023
Tell me about it
I visited Lagos to see him and my parents. When I was returning, he decided to come with me to Kaduna to see our pastor since he was on Easter break. On Sunday after church, I suggested going to a new restaurant with some of our friends, but the plan didn’t work. Instead, we hung out at a friend’s house. Two days later, a friend called and said she wanted to check out that same restaurant I’d suggested because her Aunty was coming to town, and she wanted to sample the place before taking her there. She invited our friend group and said the bill was on her.
I decided to nap because I’d just returned from a church programme and knew my friends were latecomers. My boyfriend woke me up about two hours later to tell me they were waiting for us. I picked out a nice dress I’d been saving for when he was around. It was fitted and short, and I also wore heels, so I looked really good.
Oshey
When we got to the restaurant, the waiters started to bring out the food. We usually ordered platters, but there was no plate in front of me. When I asked why I didn’t have one, they said there was still a lot of food coming, so they were trying to make space. Tell me why they brought a covered plate to my front? My mind started to race, thinking of all the engagement videos I’d seen. My friends were already asking me to open it. I was right. He knelt and me to be his still waters, and after nearly going under the table, I said yes.
Lmao. What was the drama for?
I knew we would get married, but I never thought he’d propose on that trip. He repeatedly said that since we knew we were getting married, there was no need for a proposal.
Aww. So when is the wedding?
Our introduction is in June, and the wedding will be at the end of this year.
What about your school?
I should be done by June 2023, so I can plan properly with him.
What’s the plan to make money?
After my MSc, I’ll work at my father’s laboratory until the wedding. It’d be better than getting a job and asking for leave a few months after.
Fair. But what about the wedding expenses?
My parents have agreed to fund my part of the wedding, while his parents will also assist him because he’s still starting up. It’s going to be a small wedding with only our close friends and family.
Do you have conversations about money?
We’re very open about our finances, and this makes it easier for our relationship because we know what each person can do, and we’ve learned to be content with what we get. We have simple dates where we buy shawarma and ice cream or food from Chicken Republic when we can’t go to a restaurant. The expensive dates are for when we go out with friends, and he usually offers to pay. I think the bill for our birthday last year was about ₦40k. He didn’t show me.
Interested in talking about how money moves in your relationship? If yes, click here
Does he give you money?
Occasionally. Sometimes he does this when I’m broke, and I want to get something. At other times, it’s when I go out with my friends. ₦10k here, ₦10k there.
He also randomly sends me money when he gets an allowance or wins a gift voucher at work. The most he has given me is ₦120k. I added ₦50k to it and got a phone last year.
I’d saved up ₦150k for the phone, but in September, I had to get a flight ticket for my uncle’s birthday in Lagos. I also wanted to see my parents, and they weren’t comfortable with me going by road. The ticket was ₦100k.
Do you have a financial safety net?
I don’t. I try to keep aside some money I get from my uncle, parents or partner, but currently, I’m broke. I am waiting for the end of the month so I can call home.
What’s the ideal financial future for you as a couple?
Having assets in our name. Ezra is already talking about getting land in Delta State.
Why Delta?
Because some Lagos house rents can get you decent land in Delta. His parents also have property there, so we can use their plug.
Wait First is a flagship founded on a simple premise — everybody lies. Humans are lied to between 10-200 times a day while we tell one to two within the same period. And it’s so, so easy to do. All that’s needed is some burnt dodo stepped down with cold zobo, and breakfast is served.
While a lie’s a lie, all lies are not of equal standing. I mean, who hasn’t told a lie to get out of an awkward situation? Let’s see your hands. No hands? Figured.
On a larger scale, particularly during an election season like we’re in now, many people make claims which turn out false. Sometimes it’s unintentional. Sometimes they are deliberate. Unfortunately, social media is an amplifier, and fake news travels halfway around the world before facts wake up.
If it wasn’t already obvious, fake news is bad because it can spread wide-scale panic, which can cause harm and undermine the democratic process.
Fake news comes in various formats like fabrication, manipulation, advertising and propaganda. The European Parliamentary Research Service, classifies fake news into three categories.
Mal-information: Information that’s based on reality, used to inflict harm on a person, organisation or country.
Dis-information: Information that’s false and deliberately created to harm a person, social group, organisation or country.
Mis-information: Information that’s false but not created to cause harm.
For today’s launch of Wait First, we’ll look at recent claims that have made the rounds to check just how true, false or misleading they are.
A true claim is fresh banana, an outrightly false claim is burnt dodo while a misleading one is cold zobo.
Are Votes in Anambra the Size of an LG in Kaduna?
On January 2, 2023, the governor of Kaduna state, Nasir El-Rufai made an interesting claim in a TV interview. He was speaking on the chances of Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party. El-Rufai said Obi was polling poorly and couldn’t win.
He claimed, “The number of votes in Anambra is the size of one local government in Kaduna state. So all states are not equal.”
The good people at the Centre for Democracy and Development West Africa (CDD) fact-checked this claim. Here’s what they found.
“The evidence does not support El-Rufai’s position. As of February 6, 2023, INEC had not released the breakdown of registered voters per local government area.
However, the total number of registered voters in Anambra state is more than the total number of registered voters in the most populous local governments in Kaduna.
“By Kaduna’s own data, published by the Kaduna State Independent Electoral Commissioner (KADSIEC) in 2019, the local government with the highest number of registered voters is Kaduna South, which had 361,357 registered voters.
“The number of registered voters in Anambra state is more than that of the most populous LGAs in Kaduna. According to the National Population Commission (NPC), the most populous LGAs in Kaduna are Igabi, Kaduna South, and Zaria.
“These highly-populated LGAs in Kaduna have less than 700,000 people each, less than the 2,656,437 eligible voters in Anambra.”
Verdict: El-Rufai’s claim is false and therefore burnt dodo.
Did the Supreme Court give a unanimous judgment in the Lawan vs Machina case?
On February 6, 2023, Channels TV political correspondent Seun Okinbaloye broke the news that the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favour of Senate President Ahmed Lawan. The long-drawn legal battle between Lawan and Bashir Machina was over who the rightful senatorial candidate representing Yobe north is.
Okinbaloye tweeted,” Senate President Ahmed Lawan is back on the ballot after (an) intense legal battle with Mr Bashir Machina. Machina lost to Lawan at the Supreme Court in a unanimous judgment in the contest for the ticket of the party as Yobe North Senatorial Candidate.”
So what’s the verdict on this claim?
While it’s true the Supreme Court ruled in favour of Lawan, the verdict was not unanimous. The Supreme Court had five justices rule on the matter and came to a split decision. They ruled 3-2 in favour of Lawan. This claim by Uncle Seun is, therefore, cold zobo.
You should also sign up for our Game of Votes newsletter. We help you make sense of news jargon and keep you up-to-date, especially with election news. Make the subscription of a lifetime here.
Just hours to the planned November 26, 2022 resumption of operations on the Abuja-Kaduna railway corridor, the Federal Government announced a postponement. It’s not the first time the government has postponed a planned resumption since terrorists attacked the railway corridor in March.
But more than the government’s erratic announcements and postponements, Nigerians remain worried about the safety of the corridor.
You and your entire family should ride on it to and fro for one week and we will know it is now safe.
Even though all the hostages from the train attack are back home, the terrorists who kidnapped them haven’t been arrested. The only person the government has managed to arrest is a journalist who negotiated a ₦2 billion ransom for the terrorists in exchange for hostages.
There have been reports of illegal NIN enrollment offices across the country, and terrorists can use them to bypass identification safeguards. The heightened insecurity in Kaduna also doesn’t help, as terrorists killed 645 people in the state in the first half of 2022 alone.
When the Abuja-Kaduna railway corridor eventually reopens do you trust the Nigerian government to protect the lives of passengers?
Someone said Northern Nigeria’s cuisine is the most underrated food culture in Nigeria, and I agreed instantly.
Here is a list of some of the most popular and nutritious foods you’ll find in Kaduna, particularly. As you should be able to tell, I couldn’t stop craving till the very end.
1. Tuwon Shinkafa And Miyan Tuashe
Tuwon Shinkafa is a thick pudding prepared from local rice, maize, or millet, and it is usually served with different soups, including Miyan Tuashe.
Miyan Tuashe is one of the most popular soups in Kaduna and Northern Nigeria. It is a pumpkin soup best served with Tuwon Shinkafa, Masa, and other delicacies.
2. Miyan Kuka
Miyan kuka or miyar kuka is another soup that is very popular in Kaduna State and northern Nigeria, generally.
The soup is made from powdered baobab leaves and dried okra. Best served with Dawa, Tuwon Shinkafa, or Tuo Zaafi.
See soup now…
3. Masa
Masa is a rice cake. It is made by soaking Tuwo rice in water overnight, or for at least 6 hours. The rice is then rinsed and blended before it is cooked in a special pan called the “Masa pan”.
Doesn’t this look delicious?
4. Pate Masara
Pate Masara is dried corn Jollof. It is made by boiling corn and until it is soft and the water is partially dry. After which the corn is cooked, parboiled, blended with seasoned pepper, and served hot with either spinach, pumpkin leaves, or moringa.
Just look at this beauty.
5. Gwate (or Acha Porridge)
Gwate is maize pudding that is very nutritional and even advised for the intake of babies. You can find how to make it here.
6. Burabisco
Brabusco is traditionally made couscous, and it is common to Maiduguri in Northern Nigeria, particularly. Brabusco goes well with a spicy stew with lots of meats playing daddy and mummy inside.
Burabisco is a fast meal that is also very filling.
7. Tuwon Dawa
Tuwon Dawa is ground guinea-corn made thick and solid and is eaten with soups like kuka and okra.
Firewood is best used to cook this meal as it might not get well-cooked on a kerosene stove or gas cooker.
8. Tuwon Acha
Tuwon Acha is a type of swallow made from grains that can be eaten with any type of soup.
9. Miyan Kubewa
Miyan Kubewa is another of Northern Nigeria’s glorious soups.
10. Miyan Yakuwa
Yakuwa is a leafy vegetable soup that has a sour taste. It can be cooked with either palm oil or groundnut oil and can be garnished with meat, stockfish, or any other ‘animal’.
Potash is also usually added to the soup to reduce the sour taste.
11. Fura De’Nunu
Okay, this is a drink. Fura De’Nunu is cow milk mixed with cooked and ground millet or sorghum. It is highly nutritious and can be taken as a whole meal.
You’re eight. Yet to suffer the indignity of a fellow student politely asking that you slide out dubs wedged between their ass crack during the nerve wracking JAMB examination (true story). Or needlessly having to learn the many ‘rax’es of a cockroach for WAEC. Oh no, your biggest worry is maneuvering the many shaped world of Quantitative and Verbal reasoning textbooks. But — imagine you couldn’t even manage that; not owed to any real shortcoming of yours, but rather because your teacher at the time, took the ‘teaching’ portion of their job description to be a passing suggestion, rather than the mandate it very clearly is.
For the hapless students of Kaduna State, which had a whopping 21 780 teachers fail to pass a Primary 4 level competency examination in 2017, this was no doubt their reality.
What.In.The.Hell.Happened?
According to Governor Nasir El-Rufai, the state, in partnership with the Nigerian Union of Teachers, decided to evaluate the competency of public school teachers. They just wanted to make sure those charged with making sure the formative years of young minds aren’t completely shot to rubbish, were actually capable of doing so.
33 000 teachers were tested. But rather than give grown teachers, I don’t know, anything but pre-pubescent level questions to answer, the state government decided to test their reasoning skills, using questions that ideally, shouldn’t have phased a regular reasoning Primary 4 pupil.
As it turned out, my estimation was a little too presumptuous, as 66% of the teachers failed to get at least 75% in the test questions posed.
You need to understand that these teachers actually headed classes, and gave tests and somehow also wondrously set examination questions for students year in and out. By failing to hit that 75% floor, the reality is, even they couldn’t manage an A in classes they were personally handling.
How.In.The.World.Was.This.Possible?
Well, proving there is no where Nigeria’s three headed nepotism monster won’t rear its ugly head, the appointment of the Kaduna State primary school teachers had for a time, been a largely politicised affair. With sorely unqualified individuals posing as teachers, answers like these were only to be expected:
Understandably, this led to the dismissal of the erring teachers. All 21 780 of them.
The People’s Response
Far as I’m concerned, anything less than symbolically asking for the heads of the teacher- hiring committees or whoever was directly responsible for their appointments, was an undeserving response to the situation.
But would you know it, that expectation was a little too lofty for how things really played out.
Earlier on, it was mentioned that the competency examination was carried out in conjunction with the NUT. This body, somehow operating under the missguided notion that individuals unable to properly list the three states of matter were teachers, withdrew support for their mass dismissal.
According to the Chairman of the State Council of the NUT, Audu Amba, their withdrawal was based on the fact that 60% was taken to be the cut-off mark and not 75%. Somehow they thought saying this out loud sounded intelligent.
Also vocal about his displeasure at the teacher’s dismissal, Senator Shehu Sani, whose well-educated children would probably mistake a public-school classroom for an above-ground dungeon of sorts, decried the sack of the near illiterate teachers, citing it as “the height of lunacy”.
He also had this to say about the situation: “Incompetence is not a reason but an excuse to sack thousands of teachers owed salaries for months”. This sentiment was shared by a host of other people.
What Happened Afterwards?
I want to say the state hired more competent teachers and the primary school students read their times tables and lived happily ever after, but this story is yet to have a happy ending.
To deal with the mass exodus of about 22 000 teachers, the state government resolved to employ 25 000 teachers in batches, to replace them.
In April of 2018 however, following the recruitment of 15 897 teachers, the government was forced to sack 4 562 of them, following their failure to write out a decent acceptance letter.
Guess we should be grateful they hadn’t magically discovered internet templates in the year of the Lord, 2018. They had found their ways into the state government’s service through dubious means, as the State Commissioner for Education, Alhaji Ja’afaru Sani stated.
The remainder of 11,335 teachers which included degree and master-degree holders, were deployed to 4 000 schools.
In December of 2018, the State Government recruited an additional 13 606 teachers to make up the 25 000 teachers required to turn the State’s education system around.
Here’s hoping we’ve heard the last of incompetent teachers in Kaduna State.
