If your child just wrote the 2019 final grade 12 exams, then this is for you. A rift has emerged between Ministry of general Education and Ministry of Finance over the marking of G12 exam scripts. As a result, it is not known when the Grade 12 internal answer scripts will be marked.

Ministry of Finance had directed that ECZ must compromise quality by changing how exams are marked. They suggested that allowances for markers be slashed and stop accommodating markers. Ministry of Finance also suggested that provinces must start marking their own papers. The argument was that this this will cut on costs, in line with austerity measures being implemented .

The Directors at ECZ and within the Ministry failed to hold their anger. Before this, they had made so many compromises to ensure that scripts are marked. They hoped that those measures were temporal. Shockingly they kept receiving worse demands every new marking session.

Now they found these new directives as enemies to our Education system. They could not just take it anymore. The accountants had gone over board and needed to be tamed.

They made it categorically clear that the risks attached to decentralisation outweighs financial considerations. Some people threatened to resign if government chose to go against their demand. They couldn’t sit while people who had no knowledge of education management kept on acting as enzymes for academic destruction.

The general consensus at ECZ is that unless government fully funds the marking process, no script will be marked.

The Zambian Times congratulate ECZ and the Ministry for this stance. Let politicians give respect to education the same way they prioritise elections.