The Delta State Commissioner for Secondary Education, Mrs. Rose Ezewu, has refuted the allegation that she had asked school principals and Chief Inspectors of Education (CIEs) to purchase the portrait of Governor Sheriff Oborevwori and that of herself.
Some sections of the Press had alleged that school principals and CIEs in Delta State were being forced to pay N30,000 to some people who said they were acting on Ezewu’s orders to use the money to purchase the portrait of herself and that of the governor.
It is assumed that the portraits will be supplied to the principals and the CIEs to hang up in their respective offices.
The commissioner has, however, described the allegation as “baseless and devoid of factual basis.”
The allegations, widely disseminated through news channels and social media platforms, said the education monitoring task force, overseen by Tony Edah as coordinator in the Delta Central senatorial district, forcibly extracted funds from education officials for the procurement of the two portraits.
One Mr. Israel Akpokeri, a director in the education ministry, was also mentioned in the controversial matter.
In response to the accusations, Ezewu said the news was the handiwork of “detractors within the education sector, motivated by reasons best known to them.”
The commissioner said the allegations were “defamatory, false, and the imaginative creations of contracted authors.”
Ezewu restated what she described as her “unwavering commitment to upholding discipline and transparency within the secondary school department of the education sector.
She said that she did not direct a director in the ministry, Mr. Israel Akpokeri, to instruct principals and CIEs to pay “kola wedging” amounting to ₦30,000, as claimed.
She dismissed the allegation as a baseless attempt to undermine her efforts to bring order and discipline to secondary schools in the state.
