CADRE TEACHERS WARNED
…It’s taboo for public workers to endorse politicians – NAQUEZ, ZNUT
By Adrian Mwanza
IT’S a taboo for public service teachers to openly endorse politicians because the code of conduct clearly indicates that they should remain impartial in their line of duty, the National Action for Quality Education in Zambia (NAQUEZ) has said.
In an interview with The Mast, NAQUEZ executive director Aaron Chansa said it was taboo and unheard of for teachers in the civil service to openly endorse a politician, whether it was President Hakainde Hichilema or an opposition leader.
He said teachers knew the consequences of such actions because their ethics were clear on the issue of politics.
“You can vote for your preferred candidate, but it is unheard of and a taboo for people to openly endorse a candidate,” Chansa said.
He said the issue could be that the teachers were being sponsored by some senior individuals like the District Education Board Secretaries (DEBS).
There was no way the teachers could have managed to even print banners if they did not have the blessings of their superiors.
Chansa said people in the civil service needed to be very careful, most especially now that the country was going towards elections.
He said he wondered why Teaching Council Zambia (TCZ) and Teaching Service Commission had not moved in and taken action against all the teachers involved in partisan politics.
Chansa said government employed teachers were not supposed to be involved in partisan politics because it was against their profession’s code of ethics.
And Zambia National Union of Teachers (ZNUT) has warned government workers, especially teachers, not to engage in partisan politics but work with the government of the day.
“It is wrong for teachers and civil servants at large to engage in politics because our ethics do not allow us to,” ZNUT general secretary Muvwanjilanji Siwila said.
Recently a group of teachers publicly endorsed Hichilema as their preferred presidential candidate for the August elections saying he had done a lot for them.
The teachers, who were dressed in political attire and were carrying placards with political messages praising Hichilema paraded in a sports field to make the endorsement.
But Siwila said teachers should stop coming out in the open and supporting a certain political party in public when they were in the civil service themselves.
He said ZNUT did not encourage such behaviour and urged its members to stay away from partisan politics because it was against their ethics.
“My call to our members is that we need to remain non-partisan and work with the government of the day and not openly supporting,” Siwila said.
Siwila said the rule was clear as people were supposed to do their work diligently and not openly endorsing politicians.
He said this call did not just go towards the ruling party but the opposition as well and that they needed to exhibit the highest order of professionalism.
The teachers behaviour has attracted criticism from members of the public.
