By Uche Aguoru
 |
| Pix provided by writer |
Abia State Universal Basic Education Board, (ASUBEB) recently received the sum of 6 billion Naira from Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), this fund was meant to facilitate successful implementation of UNIVERSAL BASIC EDUCATION (UBE) projects, with the primary aim of ensuring that all Abia children receive basic education in a conducive and comfortable educational environment that will enhance learning as designed by UBEC and implemented across the federation.
Its therefore, becomes nonsensical, ill-advised and a poorly thought-out policy for a government that inherited about 573 primary schools, across the 17 LGAs with 85% percent of the schools in a ramshackle condition that can easily pass for a pigsty than an educational environment, with leaking roofs, caved in and torn ceilings, no seats and no learning materials. 92% of the schools do not have decent toilets, urinary and potable water, exposing the teachers and their pupils to the dangerous and unhealthy habit of having to turn the nearest bush into their place of convenience, in some of the schools, some classes do not have blackboards, while 98% of the schools do not have perimeter fences, which means exposing the students and their teachers to unimaginable insecurity in today’s Abia where kidnapping, herdsmen incursion and other forms of criminality have become a part of our everyday existence. Those, no longer make headline news.
It is a goof that a government with good knowledge of its educational environment will embark on the construction of only 4 new school facilities with 65% of the 6 billion naira and reconstruction of 132 classroom blocks only as against over 573 primary schools scattered across Abia state with the money accrued to the state through ASUBEB by UBEC neglecting the larger component of educational facility across the state unattended to.
For governor Okezie Ikpeazu PhD, a supposed scholar and one who had dwelled and earned a living through the educational sector to have neglected the state of degenerate infrastructure across the existing educational facilities as we have it in Abia today, only to embark on the proposed construction of additional 4 schools, using his exact language “Model Schools”, calls for questioning as to the real intentions of the governor bearing in mind that statistics have proved that Abia currently housing over 573 primary schools is not experiencing shortfalls in number of schools.
 |
| Pix provided by Writer |
A prudent, responsible and transparent administration would have made sure that the funds so secured are utilized properly by ensuring that the funds are fully injected into reconstruction, re-equipping and repairing of the existing school facilities with the knowledge that 98 percent of our primary and secondary schools are in dire need of repairs across the state. Unless the government wants to prove right the assertion that most of the companies that got the ASUBEB 6 billion naira contract are not inexistent but were hurriedly set up by high-profile government officials for the primary purpose of securing this contract with no intention of executing it.
In as much as, I am not against the construction of new schools, be it MODEL or REGULAR. But I am of the opinion that given the dilapidated state of schools in Abia, it will be a great disservice and not a well-meaning policy to embark on the construction of new schools when the existing schools are begging for repairs. Except the government wants to use the construction of the new schools as a straw designed to drain the funds into private accounts as usual.
This type of phantom projects that hardly gets completed has become common knowledge since the coming of Ikpeazu administration. This has created an air of suspicion that such unrealistic projects are being created to plunder funds meant for the development of critical areas of the state's infrastructure and economy. A thinking governor would have known that it will benefit the state and the educational sector more if all the schools across Abia are renovated and equipped it will advance education more than to embark on the construction of new schools that 75% of Abians are sure won’t be completed.
Aguoru writes from Umuahia
**********************************************
Opinions shared on this Community Blog are solely that of the writers.
**********************************************
Please, do leave a comment.
You can get across to us through any of these channels:
Email: communemagazine@gmail.com
Call/Whatsapp: +234803 550 2253.