Ghani terms recruitment of 50,000 teachers historic

KARACHI: Sindh Information and Labour Minister, Saeed Ghani has said the simultaneous recruitment of 50,000 schoolteachers on merit in the province proves the commitment of the provincial government and the top leadership of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party to the cause of education.

He stated this while addressing a ceremony held at the NED University of Engineering and Technology on Monday to hand over appointment letters to 288 newly recruited primary and secondary school teachers belonging to Jamshed Town. The teachers had passed the recruitment test conducted by the IBA, Sukkur.

Ghani said that for the first time in the history of the country 50,000 schoolteachers had been recruited simultaneously, and the majority of the teachers inducted by the government since 2008 had been recruited on basis of merit. He informed the audience that the top leadership of the PPP, especially its chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, had given clear-cut instructions that the process of recruiting schoolteachers should remain free of all undue interference and it should be completed on a merit basis.

He said the full backing of the PPP leadership enabled the education department to complete the historic recruitment drive. He said hiring 50,000 schoolteachers in one go was a big challenge for the government, and Education Minister Syed Sardar Ali Shah, and incumbent and past secretaries of the School Education Department had worked hard to complete the task. Ghani said he had also remained associated with the recruitment drive during his tenure as education minister.

Acknowledging that problems existed in the public education sector, he said the state and government were under an obligation to sort out those issues. He said the government was bound to fulfil the responsibility of providing quality school education to children free of charge.