Iraqi teachers resort to abuse of students
With poor to absent government supervision and education policies, Iraq’s educational system seems to be stuck in the past.
It is no new phenomenon that students in Iraq are exposed to physical punishment at the hands of their teachers. But a video posted on YouTube and social media sites on March 25 showed a school principal slapping students violently in their faces. Ali Hassan, a teacher from the Maysan governorate in southeastern Iraq, told Al-Monitor that the students in the video are 8-10 years old. According to the educational media manager for the Maysan governorate, Mohammed Hamza al-Kaabi, the video had been in the possession of the Directorate of Education for two weeks before it went viral on social media.
As a result, there was a massive wave of demands to dismiss the principal on the grounds of using excessive violence, and to prosecute him.
