3. The anger of teachers/civil servants
Anyone who knows the politics of Ekiti will know that no politician can be in the bad books of teachers and civil servants and expect to win any election in the state. Fayemi got into trouble with them very early in his administration. First was the issue of promotion and payment of the new teachers’ salary scale, TSS. Fayemi was said to have told teachers that he would not be able to pay the money owing to paucity of funds in government coffers. That was in 2011. But a month to the election, he announced that he would implement it. In the same vein, the service reclassification exercise, though good on paper, was a political suicide. The exercise saw to demotion of some principals to vice-principals and vice-principals to classroom teachers. In fact, some of those affected could not accept the “humiliation” and as a result put in retirement notice. Primary school teachers refused to take the reclassification examination but they were also aware that should the governor come back, they would be in trouble as they would either be forced to take the test or face the sack. They mobilised massively against the governor on the eve of the election.
