Kindiki Says Government Has Surpassed Teacher Recruitment Target

NAIROBI, Kenya Aug 22 – Deputy President Kithure Kindiki has said his administration will surpass its five-year target of recruiting 116,000 teachers.

He told a meeting of the Mt Kenya Grassroots Leaders that the government will reach 120,000 new teachers by the end of this month, four years into its term.

“We had committed in our manifesto to employ 116,000 teachers in Kenya to make sure the children of the rich, the children of the poor, all of them get teachers in school. They can have quality education. I am happy to report four years later we are now going to surpass our own target instead of 116,000 teachers. By this month we will have recruited 120,000 teachers in the Republic of Kenya,” the DP said.

He said the government had initially been recruiting about 5,000 teachers annually but increased the pace to more than 20,000 teachers per year to address the shortage.

Kindiki said maintaining the previous recruitment rate would have taken about 20 years to achieve the number of teachers employed under his administration in just five years.

He said the recruitment is intended to ensure children from both wealthy and poor families have adequate access to teachers and quality education.