THE Education Ministry will take stern action against any of its officers found to have abused their power in processing applications for the transfer of teachers, following an allegation making the rounds on Facebook since yesterday, said its minister, Maszlee Malik

Maszlee said he treated the allegation as a serious matter because it involved the integrity of its officers.

He said an internal inquiry had been initiated to study the issue.

Maszlee said a police report had also been lodged by a senior ministry official today to investigate the owner of the Facebook account, a “Nur Amirah” which was said to have made viral the case of power abuse involving payments for processing the applications of teachers wishing to be transferred.

“No one is above the law. We treat the allegation seriously, as we want to ensure that the new administration practises good governance and gives the right (to apply for transfers) to those who are qualified,” he said in Shah Alam today.

Maszlee added that transfer applications for teachers were opened once a year, and this year’s period was from February 18 until March 25, during which a total of 25,332 teachers had applied.

Of the total, 2,133 applications had been approved for the June 2018 session, involving the transfer of 1,257 primary school teachers and 876 secondary school teachers.

Maszlee said that the highest number of approvals for the transfer applications were given to those following their spouses (951 people), duration of service (387), other valid reasons (368), chronic diseases (219), mutual applications (168), and cases of security threats (40). – Bernama, June 3, 2018.