The commissioner of Wulu County in South Sudan’s Lakes State has ordered the suspension of six (6) teachers who wrote a petition protesting the deduction of their motivational incentives.
The six teachers included three members of the organized forces who had ventured into helping students in the area.
Last week, tutors in the area expected to receive SSP 22,000 from the motivational fund provided by the European Union but county authorities demanded that each teacher contribute SSP 5,000 for an unexplained purpose.
Some of the teachers rejected the idea and wrote a letter petitioning the education director over the matter.
The area commissioner then ordered the arrest of those who resisted the directive and detained them for three days.
Nelson Mbio, one of the detained teachers, said they were released last Friday after spending three days at the Wulu Central Prison.
“We were forcefully taken from our homes and arrested. They did not torture us but we were chained and spent three days in prison until the commissioner formed his committee to investigate and then 12 of us were released,” he said.
According to Mbio, the county authorities were angered by the letter the teachers wrote to the education department.
“We wrote a letter complaining to the state ministry of education against the director of education in Wulu County concerning our salaries from the European Union teachers’ motivation fund,” he explained. “Each teacher was forcefully ordered illegally to contribute SSP 5,000 of his salary out of the SSP 22, 500 that we were about to receive for the last two months. Each (teacher) was supposed to receive SSP 45,000.”
Mbio said that the affected teachers had not received a copy of the suspension letter.
On his part, Wulu County Commissioner Jima Diffala Rejab confirmed that he ordered the education county director to suspend three members of the organized forces serving in the education department and three other teachers.
He claimed that the six participated in trying to remove the county education director in Wulu County.
“The reason they wrote a complaint was that they wanted to unseat the county education director from his position,” he said.
When contacted, a Member of Parliament representing Wulu County in the Lakes State transitional legislative assembly, Taban Manyiel, strongly condemned the commissioner and education director for arresting teachers who were rightly complaining about their rights.
“These teachers were recommended by their organized forces units to come and help teach children in the community and the ministry recruited them based on their qualifications,” he said. “Who is not a soldier? The commissioner himself is a police officer and even the executive director. All of them are soldiers from different units including myself. I am a Brigadier General and I am an MP representing the Wulu constituency in Lakes State parliament.”
The lawmaker urged the commissioner to reverse his decision and respect the rights of the teachers.