The Teaching Council of Zambia says did not in anyway charge applicants fees to enable them qualify for the recent teacher recruitment but the money applicants paid to the Council of Zambia was for purposes of teacher Registration.
In a statement, the Teaching Council of Zambia must be separated from the teacher recruitment exercise as it is not an employer and therefore not mandated to recruit teachers.
It said teacher recruitment is a mandate of the Teaching Service Commission which is the employer of teachers in the Public sector.
Below is a full statement
THE TEACHING COUNCIL OF ZAMBIA
PRESS Release (Wednesday 6th November, 2017)
RE: Clarification on 2017 Teacher Recruitment
The Teaching Council of Zambia is concerned with some comments being expressed by some stakeholders in society over the recent 2017 teacher recruitment. As the Teaching Council of Zambia we wish to clarify issues that have been topics of intense discussion in the media.
Firstly, the Teaching Council of Zambia must be separated from the teacher recruitment exercise as it is NOT an employer and therefore not mandated to recruit teachers.
This is a mandate of the Teaching Service Commission which is the employer of teachers in the Public sectors. To the contrary, the mandate of the Teaching Council of Zambia, as provided for by the Teaching Profession Act No. 5 of 2013, is to regulate the teachers, their practice and professional conduct from both the public and private sectors.
Furthermore, the mandate of the Teaching Council of Zambia is to provide for the accreditation of all colleges of education.
The Ministry of General Education issued an advertisement for teacher recruitment with one of the requirements being registration of applicants with the Teaching Council of Zambia pursuant to section 26 sub (1) (a) of the Teaching Profession Act No. 5 of 2013 which states that:
‘A person shall not, unless the person is _registered_ as a teacher and holds a practicing certificate under this Act’ – practice as, be employed as, offer teaching services as, or hold out to be, a teacher; further, section 10 (1) of the said Act indicates that: ‘A person shall apply to the Council for registration as a teacher in the prescribed manner and form upon payment of the prescribed fee’ in other words, the main role of the Teaching Council of Zambia is to foster professionalism in the Teaching Profession from ensuring that teachers have minimum entry qualifications to ensuring that the teacher’s professional ethics is in conformity with the code of conduct of the teaching profession.
This, therefore, means that, the Teaching Council of Zambia did NOT in any way charge applicants fees to enable them qualify for the teacher recruitment but the money applicants paid to the Teaching Council of Zambia was for purposes of teacher Registration.
It is a one off payment, suffice to mention that what follows is the payment of a practicing certificate pursuant to section 15 which equally states that “a teacher shall apply to the Council for a Practicing Certificate in the prescribed manner and form upon payment of the prescribed fees.” In Zambia, teacher registration is law.
Given the afore stated, there was no illegality what so ever to what happened before the teacher recruitment exercise in terms of payment of fees as this is provided for in the law. The practicing Certificate is renewable after three (3) years for any teacher. It must be emphasized that the teacher is a continuous process.
We wish to take this opportunity to update members of the public regarding the qualification verification for teacher registration.
In September this year, 498 applicants were found to have presented forged certificates to support their teacher registration application.
Since teacher registration is an on-going process, in October, the number of those with forged certificates shot up to 641. This was from the serving teachers from both public and private schools.
Within the same month of October, 2017 more applicants tendered their applications for teacher registration and by coincidence these were also applying for teacher recruitment as announced by the Ministry of General Education.
Interestingly, 102 applicants presented forged certificates from the verification exercise facilitated by the Examination Council of Zambia. At the moment, a total of 743 applicants have been found to have presented forged certificates which were either academic or professional qualifications.
In order to bring sanity in the Teaching Profession, the Teaching Council of Zambia will scrutinize all teacher registration applicants so that only rightly qualified people are employed.
It is in this regard that we wish to advise stakeholders, teachers and the general public to engage the Teaching Council of Zambia on any matter of interest to them. Its important to get the right picture and appreciate the rationale behind the establishment of the regulatory body for the teaching profession.
ISSUED BY: MS. NGOZA MALONGA
SPOKESPERSON- TCZ
APPROVED BY: DR. EBBY MUBANGA
REGISTRAR – TCZ
How can TCZ twist facts without shame….professional bodies are everywhere…Nursing, Engineering, Legal fraternity..etc
TCZ were not in order to include the registration fee for professional body on the application form.. all they needed to say was…successful applicants shall only be considered for employment upon presentation of a certificate or show proof of being a member of the Teaching profession body….as in this case only the 3000+ successful applicants would have registered than the whole thousands of applicants who were not successful…and most of these memberships are only valid for a year…
there could have been a better way than asking all the applicants to register at the time of the application…
Agree entirely with these sentiments, Scrutinizerer. It was a question of taking undue advantage of the helpless job seeker on the part of the TCZ! They should be ashamed; really.
Please, as a Teachers’ professional body, ensure your press releases are impeccable! In other words, mind your language. Issued by; Approved by. Did any of those seemingly learned nomenclatures ever edit or proofread this? Employ me, if you can’t pen good.
@scrutinizerer; agree with you; the outcry from the teachers also is that some who did not qualify have been taken on as teachers; TCZ should refund the registration fee or the TSC should be sued; crooks at TCZ and TSC had just wanted to get money from the graduate teachers when they knew they did not have enough positions for teachers with the corrupt crooks at TSC giving jobs to their relatives and friends or those who had paid bribes;
Another Thieving institution.
Can they refund these not successful, since they are not teachers yet.?