Learning was paralysed at Ugenya High School on Monday, February 13 after hundreds of students went on a rampage to protest the transfer of their principal.
The students walked out of classrooms and took to the streets of Ugunja trading centre, accusing the Teachers Commission (TSC) of engineering the move.
Carrying twigs and placards, they stormed out of the school and matched 10 kilometers to Ugunja town.
Some of the placards were written, “we can’t allow our school to be dumping sites for rejects”.
It is reported that Ugenya Principal Clement Nyangacha was to be replaced by besieged former St Mary’s Yala Principal Bonventure Ollando.
Ollando had been rejected at Riokindo School in Kisii before the Siaya TSC recommended him for Ugenya High School.
The rowdy students whose protests caused traffic snarl-up at Kisumu Busia Highway demanded the immediate reinstatement of their preferred principal by the TSC.
It prompted, the principal (Nyangacha) and County Director of Education Nicholas Oyucho to intervene and restore order in Ugunja before ordering them back to school.
The students that left at 8:00 am after the assembly meeting returned to the school at 11:00 am under the escort of anty-riot police officers.
Students’ President Elias Odhiambo said the circumstances under which the principal was being transferred to Kebirigo High School in Nyamira County were unclear.
“The principal had strategies to ensure discipline that had a positive impact on our academic performance. But those at the TSC have decided to transfer him hence derailing the performance of the school,” the students’ leader said.
Odhiambo said the principal would be the nineth one to face transfer in the school.
“We have lost eight teachers in the past and if Nyangacha is transferred, we have lost a strategist,” he said.
A teacher, who sought anonymity, said the issue of the transfer of the principal is not a matter of life and death.
“Must he be transferred? In fact, our school is not a dumping ground for rejects,” the source said.
Oyucho said they had received complaints from students and were probing the accusations.
“We had directed them to write their plights and omit their names and forward it to us so as to know the problems bedeviling the school,” Oyucho said.
It is so sad that this is happening at a time parents are admitting their children to school.
“We have also met a parent who came back to monitor his son who was sick yesterday. The son had been under medication but had joined the rioting colleagues,” Oyucho added.
