Promotion Stagnation: Education Officers Seek Legislators’ Urgent Intervention

Uchechukwu Nnaike

The National Education Officers Association of Nigeria has called for the intervention of the National Assembly into what it described as the deplorable state of the promotion stagnation of education officers in the Federal Ministry of Education and its negative consequences to prevent an imminent crash.

In a statement signed by the National Secretary, Prince Tadese Abayomi Fatai, the association also appealed to the lawmakers to encourage the minister to seek for executive waivers to create more vacancies for it to be captured with the supplementary list to be published soon. 

“The criteria for promotion as contained in the public service rule is 60 per cent and above. Education officers have been marginalised since the inception of elongation, our question therefore remains, ‘is harmonization of service for Education Officers as we have in the universities and judiciary to mention a few, a curse or a blessing to us’?”

The association noted that in 2023, all the directorate (Grade 15-16) officers in the Federal Ministry of Education (FME) who were due for promotion were denied the promotion interview opportunity even after verification of staff for the examination by the Federal Civil Service Commission. No vacancy was declared for only FME out of the MDAs. 

“The 2024 promotion result was published on Wednesday 13/11/2024 and out of over 4,000 directorate cadre officers that attended the promotion examination in FME/Interview, only 70 were promoted unlike other MDAs where 80 to 140 were promoted in a particular grade level.

“The policy of harmonization of service that is supposed be a motivation to education officers for effective and efficient productivity is now hurting us and affecting our output drastically, both in all the 115 Federal Unity Colleges, the headquarters and other offices,” the statement added.

The association regretted that education officers all over the country were invited to Abuja for the examination process, irrespective of the risk factor, resources etc, and only 70 were promoted in all cadres. It added that the process took the life of a staff who was involved in a fatal motor accident on his way back home.

Explaining further, it stated that out of 272 grade level 16 to 17 that were selected for the oral interview from the FME, only three were promoted to director after their second visit to Abuja from all over the country, while 78 were promoted for director cadre alone in one of the MDAs. 

“This is indeed laughable with waste of resources, manpower and risk factors. Out of more than 2,000 education officers on GL15 (assistant director) that took the promotion examination to GL16, only 14 were promoted to deputy director (GL 16), while from 14 to 15 in FME we had 53 education officers only promoted to assistant director.”

The association acknowledged the efforts of the new Permanent Secretary of Federal Ministry of Education Dr. Nasir Sanni-Gwazo, within the short time spent in the ministry in solving the problem by setting up a panel to quickly create vacancies for his staff to be promoted. 

It also thanked the House of Representatives for looking at the promotion stagnation of civil servants in one of its sittings in July, 2024.