Vanuatu Ombudsman Says Strike-Era Teacher Hiring Breached Commission Rules

Vanuatu's Ombudsman concluded in a report dated 12 March 2026 that the Teaching Service Commission's emergency recruitment of replacement teachers during a 2024 industrial dispute did not follow the commission's statutory decision-making and merit procedures. The report's finding concerns the **process used to approve recruitment**. It is not a court judgment, a finding that every newly hired teacher was unqualified, or proof of a criminal offence.

The Ombudsman's 13-page public report, reference OMB24-0045/2026/01, examined recruitment after the suspension of more than 100 teachers left schools without sufficient staff. It records a recruitment announcement on 23 September 2024. The report says the decision was approved through a written circulation or 'flying minute' signed by only two commission members, rather than a meeting with the quorum required under section 8(3) of the Teaching Service Act.

What the Ombudsman found

On page 12, the Ombudsman explicitly found that the acting chair breached section 8(3) and that the commission had not met to approve the appointments. The report also recorded findings under sections 18, 19 and 36 of the Act, including concerns about the merit process. These are the Ombudsman's administrative findings, not independently adjudicated criminal allegations.

The report included a response from the commission's acting chair, Alice Kaloran. She disputed the characterization of the recruitment as unlawful and argued that temporary appointments were necessary to protect children's education during industrial disruption. She said the commission acted in good faith and that merit and fairness were maintained despite a streamlined emergency process. The Ombudsman rejected the procedural justification, saying there was no record of the statutory quorum.

A separate court ruling on the same dispute

A **different legal issue** arising from the 2024 teachers' strike was resolved in the Court of Appeal on 14 August 2025. In *Teaching Service Commission v Vanuatu Teachers' Union*, civil appeal 1645 of 2025, the court largely dismissed the commission's appeal and left in place orders quashing suspensions of named teachers and declaring the resumed industrial action lawful. The court altered the costs award from indemnity to standard costs. That ruling did **not** itself adjudicate the validity of the replacement-teacher recruitment process examined later by the Ombudsman.

The two independent official records nevertheless describe separate oversight failures and legal disputes arising from the same period of teacher unrest: the court addressed the commission's suspension of striking teachers, while the Ombudsman reviewed the subsequent process for hiring temporary replacements. They should not be combined into a single judicial finding.

What remains unresolved

The public records reviewed do not establish how many emergency recruits remained in post by November 2026, whether the commission formally reconsidered the appointments, or whether the Ombudsman's recommendations were implemented. The government was still publicly discussing teachers' claims and conciliation obligations in October 2026, but those negotiations do not by themselves prove that the 2024 recruitment dispute remained legally unresolved.

The next accountability test is a documented commission response: the meeting minutes, appointment decisions, any reconsideration of the temporary recruitment, and a dated implementation report responding to the Ombudsman's March findings.