04 Aug 2020

Out of the 364 teachers who were eligible for promotion in Palapye for the past five years, 54 were promoted and 310 had not been promoted due to various reasons including not having enough available positions, low classroom performance and being unsuccessful in interviews.

Assistant Minister of Basic Education Ms Nnaniki Makwinja told Parliament on Monday that promotions were determined by the availability of vacancies, length of service and performance of individual teachers.

She said when a teacher joined the system they progressed from C4/3 up to the level of C1 salary scale. 

She said a teacher then needed to be promoted from C1 to D4 level. Assistant Minister Makwinja explained that D4 positions, senior teacher I - secondary and head of department - primary, and D3 positions, head of department – secondary and deputy school head - primary promotions were done through recommendations from directors of regional operations.

She said some senior positions from D2 level and above might be advertised to give all who qualified across regions an opportunity to compete. 

She said even where teachers were eligible based on the length of service and performance, their promotion was not limited to one single area as they competed for available positions within their regions and nationwide.

Ms Makwinja said teachers in Palapye were not considered alone as they competed with others within the central region and nationwide.

She also explained that her ministry employed temporary teachers as per the needs of the schools across its 10 regions based on the establishment, saying teachers were not employed based on constituency.

Ms Makwinja said as at July  24 there were 3 859 temporary teachers, 2 135 at primary, 1 435 at junior and 289 at senior secondary schools in Botswana.

She said temporary teachers’ contracts could not be converted to permanent employment because most temporary teachers were engaged where there were no positions such as where a school expanded to address COVID-19 protocols and classes had been split.

She said the current vacancy at entry level of C4/3 in which temporary teachers could be absorbed into permanent jobs nationally was 280, out of such 195 for primary where graduates from Colleges of Education were still awaited, 85 for secondary where 44 graduates were already offered appointment and awaiting assumption of duty while 37 were transferred and yet to resume duty.

She said temporary employees were paid severance pay as per the terms and conditions of temporary employment. 

She said the ministry would continue to engage stakeholders to assist with the creation of additional posts, particularly in absorbing temporary teachers engaged as a result of school expansion.

The assistant minister was responding to MP for Palapye Mr Onneetse Ramogapi, who had asked the minister to update Parliament on, among others, the total number of teachers in  Palapye who had not been promoted for the past five years, the number of temporary teachers at primary, junior and Secondary schools per constituency and why temporary teachers contracts were not converted into permanent employment. Ends