FG proscribes Benin PTA over protest, illegal charges

THE Federal government has proscribed the Parents Teachers Association (PTA) of the Federal Government Girls College (FGGC) Benin, Edo State, with immediate effect.

Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, in Abuja, on Sunday, said government took the decision to curtail the acts of gross misconduct, lawlessness and outright usurpation of Federal Government powers by officials of the association.

He also directed all principals and administrators of federal unity colleges not to have anything whatsoever to do with the National Association of Parent Teachers Associations of Federal Government Colleges (NAPTAFGC), an umbrella body of PTA of  unity colleges.

Adamu said it was a disturbing trend that the so-called national PTA body had no other source of funding other  than taxing parents outrageous and illegal charges,  adding  that this had placed unnecessary  financial burden on parents of students in federal unity schools across the country.

The minister was angry that the Edo State PTA had, prior to the resumption of schools for the 2016/2017 academic session, generated its own school fees different from the fees approved by the Federal Government and circulated same to parents of students of FGGC Benin, with an instruction that the parents should pay only what had been approved by the PTA.

“Not only did Benin PTA generate rival bills to that of the government, the association also physically mobilised parents on the day of resumption and disrupted activities while insisting on the use of their own bills,” a statement by the deputy director, Press, Ministry of Education, Mr Ben Goong said.

Deploring the actions of the Benin PTA, the minister said no responsible government would tolerate that level of lawlessness , adding that he will never allow a “Government within a government” in the unity schools.

“On the issue of NAPTAFGC, the minister said the illegal body had surreptitiously and clandestinely organised and promoted mass protests in some unity schools on resumption day over what it called a 300 per cent increase in school fees of unity colleges.