Facilitators accuse Lagos Agency for Mass Education of refusal to pay monthly stipend

Hundreds of facilitators working for the Lagos State Agency for Mass Education have accused the Agency of plan to deny them their monthly stipend with stringent conditions for clearance.

The facilitators who were trained by the Agency to help in the implementation of the State Mass Education programme across over 1000 centres in Lagos are accusing the Mrs Oluwakemi Kalesanwo led agency of grand plan to ensure majority of them do not meet up with the conditions for clearance so as to pocket their money.

Some of the facilitators who spoke with journalists on Monday decried the new conditions given by the Agency for the clearance to collect their monthly stipend, owed by the government for the month of July to December 2017.

They are insinuating that the new conditions for clearance is an attempt by the agency and it’s director to pocket the money they worked for, alleging that the director deliberately made the condition for collecting their arrears which was long overdue complicated to ensure they don’t meet up with it.

According to a facilitator from Alimosho centre who would not want her name in print, “before now, the procedure for clearance is just to fill a form including the names of your students, the progress made and challenges faced in your centre, then your zonal coordinator who is expected to have come for inspection at your centre clear you, that is all.

But they just suddenly came up with new stringent conditions for clearance, things that half of us cannot get because it was not part of the rules of engagement from inception.

“I don’t really have problem with all these conditions if we were told from the beginning that these would be the conditions for screening, we would have worked towards them, but you can’t just come up with a new rules and make them to have retrospective effect on the work we have done that you are owing us for, who does that?” She asked.

Another facilitator said, “We heard from a reliable source that the governor approved and signed this money the same time he signed the payment for January to June 2018, which they paid last month without subjecting us to this kind of condition.

If they don’t have ulterior motive why would they pay for this year before paying last year’s arrears when the money was made available same time.

“After looking for all of this and that they are asking, you now go and face a panel headed by the Director of the Agency herself to defend your claims, just because I want to collect 10,000 naira monthly,

do you know how much my transportation to my centre cost monthly?, If not for my passion for teaching, are we supposed to be taken through all this stress for this ridiculous amount you pay.

“Then I asked, over 60 centres in Alimosho, out of all the facilitators that came for the clearance last week, only 18 were cleared because of these stringent conditions, what happens to the money for the remaining facilitators, is the Agency returning them back to state purse.

“These people just want to embezzle the money because the governor is going, if nothing is done urgently about this we will mobilise ourselves to the governor’s office before they use this to blackmail him again.”

When the Special Adviser to the Governor on Education, Mr Obafela Bank-Olemoh was contacted through a WhatsApp massage to ask if he was aware of this development, he promised to investigate the matter and revert, “Will investigate n revert”. As at the time of filing this report his response is still being awaited.

Bellow is the new conditions given for clearance; All Old Facilitators and those facilitators that started /Open their centres in January / February 2017 are invited for Clearance.

They are to come with the following : 1. Certificate of Attendance. 2. Lesson Notes. 3. Learner’s Attendance Register. 4. 10 Samples of learners notes 5. Samples of marked Scripts. 6. 2017 Broadsheets

1. 2017 Lists of Learners with detailed information. 8. 2017 Graduating learners list. 9. Letter of Attestation from Headmistress or Head master /Church Leader /Mosque leader /Market Leader /Mechanic Leader /LG HOD Education.