The member representing Oriade/Obokun Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, Wole Oke, has accused the Osun State Government of frustrating his plans to recruit approximately 700 part-time teachers into public schools across his constituency.
Oke’s allegation was contained in a statement signed by his Senior Media Aide, Segun Omolebi-Sunday, and made available to journalists on Thursday in Osogbo, the state capital.
The lawmaker insisted that the initiative, which was to be implemented through his Education Trust Fund as a constituency intervention, was designed to complement rather than compete with the constitutional responsibility of the state government in providing education.
According to the statement, public schools across Ijesa North were severely understaffed at the time the initiative was conceived, with core subject teachers being scarce, classrooms overcrowded, and learning outcomes steadily declining.
“The intervention sought to provide immediate relief through the recruitment of 700 qualified teachers drawn from NCE holders and university graduates. Applications were publicly invited and received in large numbers. Candidates were shortlisted using clearly defined criteria. A neutral and accessible venue, the Ipetu-Ijesa Campus of Osun State University (UNIOSUN), was selected to ensure credibility and order. A comprehensive screening schedule was issued ahead of the exercise,” the statement read in part.
The federal legislator explained that shortlisted candidates were to undergo a rigorous selection process including briefing, aptitude testing, result verification, oral interviews and micro-teaching assessments, culminating in panel deliberations.
“Everything was set after several weeks of planning and meetings by the committee. Then, abruptly, the process was halted by the Osun State Government. There was no formal consultation with the organisers, no harmonisation framework proposed, and no structured absorption plan offered. The recruitment exercise was simply stopped,” Oke stated.
He further alleged that shortly after his recruitment exercise was stopped, the state government announced its own teachers’ recruitment, apparently to counter his plan.
In a swift reaction, the Osun State Government dismissed the lawmaker’s allegations as an attempt to score cheap political points, insisting that nothing of such occurred in public schools in the two local government areas mentioned.
The Osun State Commissioner for Education, Mr Dipo Eluwole, said he was completely unaware of any plan by the lawmaker to recruit teachers for public schools in the Oriade/Obokun Federal Constituency.
“There is nothing of such. As the Commissioner for Education, I am hearing this for the first time. Nobody stopped it. There are PTA teachers everywhere. He is only trying to score a political point. There was nothing of such,” Eluwole stated.
The commissioner’s response suggests a fundamental disconnect between the state government’s education management structure and the lawmaker’s constituency intervention efforts.
The latest disagreement adds to a series of public exchanges between the Osun State Government and Oke on issues relating to governance and politics since the lawmaker left the Peoples Democratic Party.
The federal legislator recently urged the Independent National Electoral Commission to deregister the Accord Party—the platform Governor Ademola Adeleke used to contest the last governorship election—on the grounds that it had no elected officials. His call was swiftly rejected by the governor.
Adeleke’s spokesperson, Olawale Rasheed, while reacting to Oke’s demand, described Accord as a potent and winning platform, dismissing the lawmaker’s position as an “obsession with illegal and unconstitutional thinking.”
The dispute over teacher recruitment highlights broader challenges within Nigeria’s education sector, particularly at the state level where constitutional responsibility for basic and secondary education resides.
Teacher shortages have been a persistent problem across Nigerian states, with many public schools operating with inadequate teaching staff, leading to large class sizes and compromised learning outcomes. Various stakeholders, including legislators, have attempted to address these gaps through constituency projects and interventions.
However, the coordination between such initiatives and state government education policies has often been fraught with tensions, particularly in politically charged environments where federal lawmakers and state governors belong to different political camps or have competing interests.
The role of Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) teachers, referenced by the education commissioner, has also been contentious. While they fill staffing gaps in many schools, PTA teachers are typically not on the government payroll and often work under precarious conditions with irregular remuneration dependent on parent contributions.
Constituency intervention projects, funded through the federal budget allocation to lawmakers, have become a significant feature of governance in Nigeria, with legislators implementing various projects in their constituencies including infrastructure, scholarship schemes, and human capacity development programs.
