Benue Assembly orders SUBEB boss to step aside

Benue State House of Assembly has directed the Chairman of the State Universal Basic Education Board, SUBEB, Dr Grace Adagba, to step aside to allow the house to investigate the recruitment exercise embarked upon by the board.

In addition, the house directed her to hand over to permanent member 1.

Speaker of the assembly, Hyacinth Dajo, gave the resolution after the majority of the house voted in favour of the SUBEB chairman’s stepping aside.

Dajoh had asked the Clerk, Mr John Hwande, to divide the house, and the members who voted in favour of the motion were 21, while five members voted for the counter motion.

According to the speaker, the chairman should step aside and hand over to Permanent Member I to allow the house to carry out her investigation.

The house also constituted a seven-man committee to investigate the exercise and report to the house within seven days.

The Majority Whip, Peter Ipusu, representing Katsina-Ala West state constituency, had, during the plenary, moved a motion for the stepping aside of the SUBEB chairman.

Ipusu said that the house had earlier adopted resolutions which directed the SUBEB to suspend the ongoing recruitment of Primary School Teachers to allow for investigation into controversies surrounding the exercise but regretted that the order was ignored.

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The lawmaker further said that a day after the resolution was duly conveyed, the chairman released a statement indicating that new cut-off marks had been allocated to the various local governments based on their performance in the Computer Based Test (CBT) conducted by the board and subsequently shortlisted additional names for physical screening.

He expressed worry that the statement released by SUBEB was not only reactionary but disparaging of the honour of the assembly and its resolutions.

The motion was seconded by Mr Alfred Berger, stating that the chairman lacked the integrity to continue to pilot the affairs of the board.

Berger added that the law establishing the board gave powers to the Local Government Education Authorities (LGEAs) to recruit teachers, emphasizing that the process was decentralized, and the Department of Quality Assurance of the board only supervised it.

Meanwhile, the Majority Leader of the house, Mr Saater Tiseer, countered the motion and argued that the chairman should be given a fair hearing on the matter, adding that the day the chairman was to appear before the house, she was at the assembly by 10am as requested.

Tiseer advised his colleagues not to make decisions by prejudice but suggested that the House should take actions in line with the Constitution.

The counter-motion was seconded by Anthony Agom (PDP/Okpokwu), stating that the chairman should be allowed to explain herself.

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