Principals Deserve Solutions, Not Blame for Withheld Certificates

Retaining Kenya Certificates of Secondary Education (KCSE) by Principals for students who complete secondary education with unpaid school levies has been an ongoing practice for several decades.

It has been a way schools can recover these unpaid fees full-time. However, this practice has been subject to scrutiny and community backlash.

The Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) Act, 2012, under Section 10 (1b), prohibits the retention of all certificates by the schools for any reason. This puts the Boards of Management and the principals in direct contravention of the law when they retain the certificates.

The Cabinet Secretary for Education, Dr. Julius Ogamba, recently directed the principals to release withheld KCSE, KCPE certificates regardless of outstanding fees or risk facing disciplinary action.

Furthermore, he revealed that his Ministry is exploring ways and means of sending future certificates to Sub-County Directors of Education, who would, in turn, release them to the candidates, thereby bypassing the schools.

The steps taken by the CS Ogamba raise several questions. First, the directive does not provide a way for schools to be compensated for the unpaid fees, some of which could be as high as Ksh 50,000 per student.

Secondly, why wouldn’t a policy decision be made at the national level that the administrators of the National Government Constituency Development Fund (NG-CDF) fund prioritise clearing outstanding fees in all their constituency schools before allocating bursaries to the ongoing students?

Thirdly, the proclamation that basic education is compulsory and free requires that resources have to be deployed to actualise the full implementation of the proclamation and the relevant laws.

The Boards of Management and the principals carry out delegated functions on behalf of the Cabinet Secretary while running the schools. It is expected that the Cabinet Secretary would work towards providing solutions to challenges faced by these schools through a consultative process.

Fourthly, a number of students have sued their former schools and principals for failure to release these certificates. This has caused distress among those affected considering that some of the penalties meted on them are heavy. Isn’t it an obligation of the Government to provide the resources and tools to enable its principals to work in a stress-free environment?

So, what recourse do Boards and Principals have under these circumstances? They are being blamed, and yet they are victims of circumstances.

There is a need for a better consultative process before such major decisions are made.