An act of kindness as the he would put it, has made a School Principal to be Sacked by the Teachers Service Commission.
In his own thinking the principal saw it as a small offence and pleaded guilty to it. The then school principal to kanga onditi mixed secondary school admitted to his employer that he had allowed a sick schoolgirl to cook food in his house, some of which she took to her dormitory.
He was a year into his tenure as the school principal when the incident happened. It all started when the principal was approached by two teachers – who were the boarding master and senior teacher respectively – accompanied by the schoolgirl.
The girl said she was sick and that she had spent the whole day in the dormitory, sleeping. The school did not have a dispensary, a boarding teacher or a matron. The principal took it upon himself and sent the school watchman to buy painkillers for the student.
The principal further instructed the student to go to his house where he lived with his nephew so that she can get some food as she had not eaten since morning. From the court documents Mr Onyango avers that he then retired to bed as he was unwell on the day.
TSC told the court that from its investigations which saw it interview various parties, it established that the girl spent a considerable amount of time in the principal’s house. “Having slept through supper, she went to Mr Onyango’s residence where he offered her food, which she cooked for herself,” the judge writes, summing TSC’s argument.
As a result of the findings, a TSC disciplinary committee sat, where Mr Onyango, his nephew and the schoolgirl were heard. From its cross-examinations, TSC concluded that the principal had a case to answer and was subsequently Interdicted.
The story hinges on a provision inside the TSC Code of Conduct and Ethics for Teachers that was gazetted as a subsidiary legislation in 2015. Section 22 (2) of the code says a teacher shall not “send learners to their personal residence for whatever reason”.
Somewhere in the judgment, the judge says that Mr Onyango, being the school head, “should have led by example in ensuring compliance with the employer’s codes of conduct and ethics”.
The judge said, the dismissal was entirely pegged on the act of the teacher allowing the student in his house.
“TSC’s Code of Conduct and Ethics expressly prohibits visits to teachers’ quarters by students for obvious reasons. That Mr Onyango admitted violating the code is in itself sufficient, valid and justified reason for his dismissal.
