Bauchi Assembly confirms 21 commissioner nominees

Bauchi State House of Assembly, on Thursday, confirmed all the 21 commissioner nominees submitted to it by the state governor, Sen Bala Mohammed Abdulkadir, after two weeks of screening.

The confirmation was made during the plenary after the nominees were screened by the house with the former Commissioner of Education, Dr Aliyu Usman Tilde, grilled by the members for hours before his confirmation.

The nominees screened and confirmed by the House include, Alkaleri: Abdulkadir Ibrahim; Bauchi: Garba Dahiru and Nuruddeen Abdulhamid; Bogoro: Jidauna Tula Mbami; Dambam: Ahmed Aliyu Jalam and Darazo: Dayyabu Chiroma.

Also screened and confirmed are: Dass: Maryam Garba Bagel; Ganjuwa: Adamu Manu Soro; Gamawa: Umar Babayo Kesa; Giade: Asma’u Ahmed; Jama’are: Usman Abdulkadir Middibo and Itas – Gadau: Hajara Jibrin Gidado

Others are: Katagum: Sama’ila Dahuwa Kaila; Kirfi: Hajiya Sa’adatu Bello Kirfi; Misau: Aminu Hammayo; Ningi: Alhaji Yakubu Barau: Shira: Hamisu Muazu Shira; Tafawa Balewa: Abubakar Abdulhamid Bununu; Toro: Aliyu Usman Tilde; Warji: Abdulrazak Nuhu Zaki and Zaki: Hon. Abdullahi T Musa.

The Speaker, Abubakar Y Suleiman had before the screening welcomed Dr Aliyu Usman Tilde to the house and asked him some constitutional questions which he answered to the satisfaction of the members, thereafter, the speaker allowed the members to ask him some questions.

Sale Hodi Jibir representing the Disina constituency asked the nominee; “two years as commissioner of education, we have series of complaints on how the number of children in boarding schools drastically reduced, if you are given a second chance what strategies will you adopt to overcome these challenges?”

Also, Yunusa Ahmad representing Warji Constituency asked the nominee, “just recently, Bauchi is placed as the highest number of out of school children, this happened because of your policy of introducing the English language as the only subject to determine who will go to school unlike when three subjects are combined, our children are weak in English, why do you adopt such method?

“You have introduced some examination charges for basic education examination including private schools, this caused private schools to increase their fees, comment on that. You relegated the responsibilities of some directors to one Malama Talatu and Malam Danlami, response to these allegations.”

However, Babayo Muhammad advised that members not to be asking personalised questions saying that as Chairman House Committee on Education, we have never received any complaint on any person taking someone’s responsibility in the Ministry of Education.

The Deputy Speaker, Danlami Ahmed Kawule asked the nominee; “in our constituency, their secondary schools are managed by communities, why is it that even if such schools meet the requirements of being taken over by the government, despite the request of the community, the ministry didn’t respond positively?”

Gazali Abubakar Wunti representing Ganjuwa East Constituency advised the Nominee to have a programme in the media to educate the people about the activities of his ministry.

He asked the nominee “there are allegations that you engaged the services of non-civil servants in managing the Ministry, respond, supposing you are posted to Ministry of agriculture or any ministry other than education, are you ready to serve?”

While responding, Dr Aliyu Usman Tilde explained that it is true that there are fewer children in boarding schools than when he took over as Commissioner saying, “This is because I promised you here that I will do the right thing. We have decided to expand the opportunity of quality education beyond the special schools we have.”

He also said that “We updated and upgraded boarding schools to merit schools and make sure whoever goes there is qualified. If we leave the merit schools to anyone even one who cannot write his name, spend money on him every day, the value for money and value for service will be extremely low. This is what we have abandoned.”

Aliyu Tilde added that “In special schools, we have produced excellent students who excelled everywhere because we valued merit. If you open the schools for everyone you can’t have this. To extend this opportunity to many others, we upgrade the schools and adopt merit.”

According to him, Culture is another reason we have a low number in the boarding schools now, in GSS Misau, we have 120 admissions only 35 reported, in 2020 we gave 120 admissions only 38 reports, their SS1 and SS2 are not up to 80.”

Another factor that led to the reduction of the number of children in the schools is that there are other opportunities for parents to educate their children, there are many private schools, there is the issue of insecurity, there is the issue of bad welfare in boarding secondary schools.

On Bauchi State being ranked the state with largest out of schools children, Dr Tilde said that the figure quoted is the same as 2018 statistics, and it may not be the true statistic of 2021.

He then said that “However, I am not surprised if the state continues to have this number. This is because the security situation has brought many people from other states to Bauchi. I am not in a good position to speak about this issue, Chairman of SUBEB is in a better position to answer this.”

“On admission to SS1, we adopted a policy, if a child has poor basic education, it is better you give him another chance to repeat,” he explained.

He further explained that, “We admit over 95 per cent of children who sat for the basic examination. But to be admitted into boarding school you must be able to make some sentences in English. If you can’t write your name we ask you to repeat jss3. We cannot develop if we continue to admit any child into SS1, it will not augur well for us.”

On payment of fees for basic education examination, Dr Tilde explained that “everywhere you go they pay for basic education examination. Last year, we charged 1500, this year we charged 1500.

“The number of subjects and question questions have increased. The government produced the examination questions and the parent does their own part by paying the fees. We reduced registrations fees in schools to only 750 naira but before our coming they are paying a high amount.”

On the allegation that responsibilities of some directors are taken over by non-civil servants, Dr Tilde said that “if you have limited capacity in your ministry, you have to outsource, that’s what I did.

“I didn’t go to Kaduna to engage people but I invited some former directors of the ministry. They are so knowledgeable of the ministry, they have the memory of the ministry.

“That’s why I have drawn them close to me as advisers. The directors are also doing their work. It’s only when they are given work and it has taken so much time, I ask others to do it.”

Aliyu Tilde lamented that the ministry is lacking in personnel and cannot do everything, “even registration of WAEC can’t go smoothly, we outsourced people to do it, the civil servants cannot do everything and we must outsource people otherwise it will fail as it has been failing.”

“On conversions of community schools to government schools, the government is always ready to assist communities to educate their children but there are criteria for establishing every school. If you are establishing a secondary School there are criteria on population, distance etc.

“If it is a primary school there are criteria. We are ready to see that if there is a reasonable population in a particular Community school government will take over or establish a school.

“We have converted about 12 of them. For example, we have established a Day secondary School in Darazo, we will build it the school as we are waiting for approval from the Government,” he explained.

About programmes in the media to enlighten the people, he said that “I will take this seriously, although I am always at BRC, in fact, there is no commissioner that is always in the media like me. We do that in Alabrka Radio and others. We will improve it.”

On whether he will work in any ministry posted other than education, Dr Tilde said that “If I am posted to any ministry, I am ready to work, if I will be allowed to serve the people of Bauchi State.”

Bala Abdullahi Dan asked Dr Tilde to mention three achievements he recorded as Commissioner of Education while Jamilu Umaru Dahiru Bauchi representing Central Constituency asked the nominee why he banned inter-schools transfer?

Kawuwa Shehu Damina representing Darazo Constituency said that Dr Tilde was his boss, as they worked in special schools management board, some of our directors are brought up by him now to help in transforming education in Bauchi State

He said that “You can fault Tilde for anything but not for corruption. Unfortunately for us, before you impress him as a student you have to go the extra mile and work very hard. I advise that you have to do more on publicity and public enlightenment. Change come with a lot of resistance. You should always sensitise people before coming up with programmes.”

Kawuwa Damina also suggested that there should be suggestion boxes in all offices of the Ministry and secondary schools, “like you did when we were in special schools management board.”

He reminded him of the challenge he faced when he was an adviser to Governor Muazu on education on the issue of schools feeding and so on “but now go anywhere in the world you will see your products of those schools. You should understand that you are now in a larger political environment, you have to bear with us you have to adjust.

While responding, Dr Tilde explained that as commissioner of education, he recorded 106 achievements.

He mentioned the three achievements asked as; digitization of education in various ways, merit in appointment, admission, transparency, every kobo expended is recorded.

He explained that when he presented his achievements to the Northeast Governor’s Forum, they appointed me as Chairman of Northeast Education

On inter-schools transfer, he said that if there is no legitimate reason we don’t allow it but if there is a legitimate reason we allow it. If your child is so brilliant and we admit him to a merit school we will not change him to a day School.

The Speaker asked one of the members from Toro Local Government to make a comment and Tukur Ibrahim representing Toro/Jama’a Constituency congratulated the nominee whom he said is a very wonderful and competent man.

Bala Abdu Rishi representing Lame Constituency said that he is proud of their worthy son from Toro Local Government who has performed wonderfully and said that Dr Tilde has been contributing a lot towards the development of Toro.

Bala Abdu added that the people of Toro are happy with his achievements and the commendations he is receiving from all quarters and emphasized that change is not easy, even in the villages they know about the achievements of Dr Tilde.

The Speaker asked Dr Tilde, having satisfactorily responded to all questions, to take a bow and go.

After successful completion of the screening of the 21 commissioner nominees, the house dissolved the committee of the whole to confirm the nominees.

The Speaker, Abubakar Y Suleiman explained that whenever there is revolution or change there must be some difficulties and urged the people of Bauchi State to bear with Dr Tilde by giving him the chance to transform education in the state.

The Speaker hoped and prayed that the governor will not post Dr Tilde to any Ministry but Ministry of Education “because if he is not posted there, the success and transformation recorded may be destroyed.”

He explained that the quality of civil service can’t be compared to the past time thus Tilde must come up with policies to ensure quality service delivery.

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Bauchi Assembly confirms 21 commissioner nominees

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