The Chairman, Cross River State Universal Basic Education, (SUBEB), Dr. Steven Odey, has dispelled allegation making the rounds in the state that SUBEB has sacked eleven primary school teachers in the state.
Odey, debunked the allegations while fielding questions from journalists on the on-going teachers verification exercise embarked upon by the board across the three senatorial districts of the state.
The SUBEB boss, explained that the board under his watch could not have been so callous to lay off people without following due process, pointing out that, the Board only deployed those with no teaching qualifications to places where they can function adequately.
“It would be recalled that SUBEB had two weeks ago embarked on a verification exercise to ascertain the number of teachers in the payroll of the state. Upon getting in Biase Local Government Area of the State, some teachers were discovered not to have possessed the requisite qualification needed to teach and they were redeployed to work in the security units where their service were necessary.
But people misconstrued the purpose of the verification exercise and began peddling rumour that the affected teachers had been disengaged from the teaching service. The personnel verification exercise is on-going and the Executive Chairman has not made his report public as investigations are still on-going,” he said.
Continuing, he said, “apart from superintending the affairs for SUBEB, I am also a legal practitioner and as such cannot divulge my report without sufficient evidence.”
In his words, “It has come to the notice based on what I have read on some of the dailies that, the State Universal Basic Education Board has laid off some teachers in the primary school. The publications are misleading the public with inaccurate information.”
“Let me state categorically here that, SUBEB has not sacked any staff in its on-going personnel verification and biometrics/image capturing exercise of primary school teachers and staff of Local Government Education Authorities (LGEAs) in the state,” he maintained.
Odey stated that, the board appreciated the fact that media organizations are keeping the public abreast with activities of the board, stressing that, the board was willing to give whatever information needed by media for public consumption just as the doors of the board are widely open for whatever partnership needed by the media men.

Friday Nwagbara, Calabar