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Fraudsters purporting to be education officials are on the prowl, swindling teachers facing disciplinary action by promising to help deal with their cases. The fraudsters are working in cahoots with some unscrupulous Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education officials, demanding payments of between US$150 and US$500 to help the teachers in their impending disciplinary cases. Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe president, confirmed the unscrupulous behaviour by some ministry officials.

The basic education ministerial task team report into the “jobs for cash” scandal has found that corruption is endemic in the education system and the first step in stopping this is to end cadre deployment. The task team’s report, into allegations that some members of South African Democratic Teachers' Union (Sadtu) have been selling posts for money, has also raised issues within the appointment process in the sector. As a result, the department says it will establish interviewing and appointment panels that would be vetted regularly, as well as reviewing the appointment system as a whole.

The SA Democratic Teachers Union came out strongly against the basic education department on Sunday, accusing senior officials of being involved in a jobs-for-cash syndicate and claiming that high ranking officials in the education department had either accepted bribes or used undue influence to appoint teachers and principals. But this allegation was rejected by an education spokesperson.

The EFF calls on the Basic Education minister to take decisive action against members of SADTU and other officials of the department who have been given jobs through illegal means. The Minister has announced that the department welcomed a report by its investigative task team which found that of a "total of 75 cases" it dealt with, 30 provided "grounds for reasonable suspicion or wrongdoing".

The SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu) was fingered as the main culprit in a damning report into the alleged selling of teachers' posts released on Thursday. According to a report by the Basic Education Minister’s task team, government systems have allowed an exploitation of the system, which compromised proper appointments of critical educator posts.

Teacher unions have expressed concern over fresh reports of examination malpractice in some parts of the country. This follows reports that 30 people, among them 13 teachers and 9 pupils were recently arrested in Kapiri and Mkushi for being in possession of grade nine 2014 examination papers.

A task team has begun investigating the alleged selling of teacher posts, the basic education department said on Sunday. The team has started to do its work and several interviews have been held with union's department spokesperson.

The reforms impose centralized teacher assessment and seek to end corrupt practices in the education system. Those practices include the buying and selling of teaching positions. However, unions say the reforms could lead to big lay-offs, and critics also suggest they may be paving the way for the privatization of Mexico's education system.