The two convicts who later pleaded guilty to five count corruption charges were serving as examiners at the 2017 West Africa Secondary School Certificate Examination General Mathematics Paper-2 and improperly conferred an advantage on Amie Fayia, a candidate at the 2017 West Africa Secondary School Certificate Examination, between 12 April 2017 and 15 June 2017, in the Freetown judicial district in the Republic of Sierra Leone.
Justice Ernest Gooding also found Mohamed P Konneh and Sahr Mani guilty of the offence of abuse of office by improperly allowing Amie Fayia with index number 0010612066 to re-sit the subject, General Mathematics Paper-2 and also accepting an advantage, contrary to the same Section (35) sub Section (1) of the Anti Corruption Act N0.12 of 2008.
In his plea of mitigation, Counsel for the convict, C Campbell canvassed the presiding judge that the convicts are first time offenders of the law and bread winners of their families.
He further canvassed the Bench not to hand down custodian sentence on both convicts, as they have learnt their lessons already and he will continue to admonish them about the consequences of such action.
Delivering his judgment, Justice Ernest Gooding stated that teachers should served at builders and not destroyers, adding that one cannot make a genius out of an idiots , because according to him, an idiot is an idiot.
He informed the court that education is the back born of any progressive and developing or developed nations and furthered that the standard of the country’s education system has dropped drastically and considerably to the extent that the education system of the West African state of The Gambia has improved extensively , which cannot be compared to that of Sierra Leone.
Justice Gooding accused rogues teachers in the country’s education system of creating geniuses out of idiots at the expense of the nation, and observed that if such a disgracefully and backward trend is not reversed or nip in the bud, the dream of Sierra Leone achieving an advanced and modern education system for the future of future generation is doomed.
He also banned both convicts not to practice the teaching profession for five years, and insisted that his court found both convicts culpable on all of the five count corruption charges preferred against both convicts.
