By Eseoghene Emuke
The Delta State government has suspended the headmistress of Okotie-Eboh Primary School 1, Sapele Local Government area of the state, Mrs Vero Igbigwe.
She was suspended following the viral video where little Success Adegor was sent home over her parents’ failure to pay her examination levies.
Igbigwe was suspended on Monday when the Delta State Commissioner for Education, Barr. Chiedu Ebie visited the school.
The head teacher, according to the commissioner, could not explain the alleged illegal collection of examination levies from the schoolchildren.
Ebie told journalists after his fact-finding mission to the school that a detailed investigation would be conducted to unravel the role of the teacher and any other person that was involved in the illegal levy collection.
He said Mrs Igbigwe would remain suspended pending the outcome of the panel report that will be set up to thoroughly investigate the incident.
According to him, “There is right to fair hearing. So, what will happen is that a detailed investigation would be set up to look into the issue in details.
“Like I did say, I conducted a preliminary investigation but in the interim we have to suspend her (Mrs Igbigwe) as the head teacher of this school pending the outcome of the investigation.
“That suspension will take effect as from today (Monday). Obviously, there are contradictions in her story because everybody was there when they talked about school fees. It was obvious that Success was sent home because of her inability or her parents to pay the supposed fees which is not in any way part of the 2018/2019 levies.”
The commissioner added that the state had since awarded the construction and upgrade of the school structures before the video of Success being driven home went viral last week on the social media.
Ebie, a lawyer, added, “First of all, you need to take into consideration that we are not just dealing with one school. In Delta State, we have 1,125 public primary schools; we have 465 public secondary schools and six technical colleges. It is not humanly possible to attend to all of them at the same time. What we do is that we deal with them in phases.”
He was accompanied on the visit by the Chairman of Sapele Local Government Council, Chief Eugene Inoaghan, a former state Commissioner for Housing, Chief Paulinus Akpeki, and other top officials of the ministry.
