Delta Teachers Threaten to Take Govt to Court Over Alleged Illegal Deduction of Salary for Purchase of Laptops

By Ovedhe Jerry.

Teachers in Delta State have threatened to take the state government to court over what they described as illegal deduction of their February salary for purchase of laptops.

The teachers gave this threat when hundreds of primary school teachers across Isoko South and North Local Government Area of Delta State today besieged the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) and Local Government Education Authority offices in a protest.

The aggrieved teachers protested from Uzi Primary School and Amawhe Primary School Ozoro to the Local Government Education Authority in Oleh  carrying  placards with inscriptions like:”Why are we short paid,” “NUT Fight to protect your teachers,” “We need our money,” “Stop illegal deduction from our salaries,” “This is injustice against primary school teachers,” “This is a criminal offence,” and many more.

The protesting teachers accused the State and local government of imposing the purchase of computer laptops on them, which they described as injustice and criminal offence.

Speaking with our correspondent, on behalf of the protesting teacher, Comr Mrs Lizzy Ejenawho. She said that government has not paid them their salary since febuary which they didn’t complain.

In her words, ”Yesterday being 9th of May, 2016, government paid us Febuary salary and we notice that they deducted some certain amount from our salary. This is unknown to us, because we never subscribed nor bargained for it.

”When we inquired, we were told that the deduction is for the sales of laptop computers which we have never negotiated with government for. We don’t know the brand, neither the amount nor do we know the durability.

”If they want us to buy laptops we can buy them by ourselves. This is injustice against us (the primary school teachers). We want this money refund within the next seven days or we will go court over it,” Comr Mrs Lizzy Ejenawho said.

Receiving the aggrieved protesting primary school teachers in his office. The Chairman Nigeria Union of Teacher (NUT) Isoko South chapter, Comr Lucky Otuwho, said that, the complains of the protesting teacher has been received and will be channeled to SUPEB where they will be attend to in due time.