Riara Teacher Fired For Sharing Nude Pictures Wins Case Against School
A teacher who worked at the Riara Group of Schools in Nairobi, Kenya has emerged victorious from a court battle against the private institution.
Apollo Amanya, an art teacher, was terminated from his contract on March 18, 2021 for emailing pornographic content to senior members of the school staff, which was a violation of the school’s e-learning policy.
The Employment and Labour Relations court, however, found that Amanya was indeed guilty of circulating obscene images but that the process of dismissing him was unfair.
According to the judge, Justice Bernard Manani, while the school had valid grounds to terminate Amanya’s contract, they failed to provide evidence that they had upheld due process in doing so.
As a result, the teacher was awarded Sh110,000, equivalent to two months of his salary, as compensation for the wrongful termination.
The reason for Amanya’s termination was the unsolicited circulation of pornographic materials within the school.
The offensive content was sent twice to the official emails of the school staff. The school claimed that between February 24 and 25, 2021, Amanya sent the material and that it was in contravention of the school’s e-learning guidelines, which he was aware of.
Amanya, however, stated that his email had been hacked and that he had reported the intrusion to the police immediately after he became aware of it.
Despite changing his password, another set of images was circulated from his email account on February 26, 2021.
The court noted that the teacher confirmed that his email account was unsecured, which suggested that it did not have a functional password.
Amanya reported the intrusion into his account on March 19, 2021, a day after he was subjected to the school’s disciplinary process and terminated.
However, the judge raised questions about the validity of his claim, suggesting that it may have been a tactical attempt to lay the ground for the current petition.
Additionally, Amanya had made allegations of harassment against the school’s senior staff.
He claimed that they required him and other members of staff to repeat assignments without apparent reason and that the deputy head teacher used derogatory language against him, recorded proceedings of a meeting with him without permission, and forced him to work overtime.
The school, however, denied these allegations and stated that Amanya was underperforming on his core mandate and had deviant behavior.
Riara Teacher Fired For Sharing Nude Pictures Wins Case Against School