Ghost teachers in Balochistan: With political backing, attendance is a mere formality

Provincial government continues to fund schools, teachers for work not done.

QUETTA: While university professors in Balochistan have fallen victim to target killings, thousands of ‘ghost’ teachers and schools continue to draw funds from the provincial government through political manoeuvring.

This was disclosed in the “Media and Civil Society Collaboration Workshop” organised on Friday by an NGO called Pakistan Coalition for Education (PCE) in Quetta. A number of representatives from civil society organisations and various print and broadcast media outlets were in attendance.

Chief of the Quetta Bureau of Dawn News Syed Ali Shah said that an official in the Balochistan education department had told him that over 5,000 ghost teachers were receiving salaries and 3,000 ghost schools were receiving funds from the Balochistan government. “Hardly one per cent of the funds received by the provincial government are being utilised for development projects in the education sector,” Shah said, elaborating that 7,000 registered religious seminaries were operating in the province but government schools were functioning only on paper despite being funded.

Some participants drew the members’ attention towards the role of political and tribal leaders in aggravating the issue.

Local journalist Kalimullah, from Urdu language daily Bakhabar, claimed that 10,000 ghost teachers were drawing salaries and many of them had political backing. “Most government teachers in Balochistan work as political workers for various parties,” he said.

Educationist Yasmin Lehri agreed: “Most ghost teachers are related to political and tribal leaders of the province and so their families are paid their salaries,” she said. English daily Dawn’s Bureau Chief for Balochistan Saleem Shahid emphasised the need to eliminate political interference in appointing teachers and handling other administrative matters of educational institutions.

Shahid also pointed out that the mainstream media of Pakistan did not provide enough space and coverage to Balochistan’s issues. “This does not help in tackling the prevailing sense of deprivation among young Baloch people,” he said.

Shehzada Zulfiqar, from English daily Pakistan Today, said that media organisations assigned fewer people to cover Balochistan. He also said that declaring the mother tongue as the only medium of instruction for education would lead to isolation.

However, Eisa Tareen, a journalist from INP news agency, said that teacher unions had threatened reporters if they tried to highlight the issue of ghost teachers and negligence in Balochistan.

Responding to this, PCE’s national coordinator Zehra Arshad said that information on the condition of Balochistan’s education department should be shared through the internet, including groups and blogs.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 27^th, 2011.