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News and Media |
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08
Jul
2010 |
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Lagos shall surmount its education sector challenges, pledges Sosan |
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| Deputy Governor of Lagos, Mrs. Sarah Sosan, who also doubles as the Commissioner for Education, spoke to ROTIMI LAWRENCE OYEKANMI and MARY AKPARANTA on the feats and challenges of the state in the education sector. Excerpts:
Efforts on Technical and Vocational Education
Immediately we got on board in 2007, one of the first things we did was to look at what we have on ground in the education sector. We went round to see our technical colleges. We have only five of them and we discovered that we needed to do a lot of things: rehabilitate, get enough teachers, and make the environment more appealing, most especially to parents, because of the misconception they have about technical and vocational education.
Apart from that, we also made effort to have a Board that will properly manage the affairs of the schools in place. We worked from there and luckily, last year, the Bill scaled through. It was passed into law and the Board was inaugurated. So we now have a board in place that is managing the affairs of these schools.
Another plus we have in that area is that the Executive Secretary is a Rector of one of our Polytechnics, who is very vast in that field. That shows the seriousness we attach to the issue of technical and vocational education in the state.
We felt that, why do we have to depend on neighbouring states to get skilled hands, when we can produce them here? When we have a lot of infrastructure development going on in the country now and we can also produce these people that have these skills? They can be on their own, they can be employers and they can fill those gaps in most of the construction companies.
We are now partnering with some of the companies, so that they can have hands-on skills, after spending a period of maybe one session. They can then go and acquire a proper skill out there. Apart from that, we have been partnering with one of the colleges in the United Kingdom, Haklin College, so that they could come over to train some of our people, while some of the managers or principals of these colleges may be taken abroad as well for training, to observe how a technical college is being properly managed.
We have a vacancy of 227 and His Excellency (Governor Tunde Fashola) gave approval that we should fill in all these teachers. But we are still looking for those that have the right qualification because we really want qualified people in those schools.
So, that shows that we are spending a lot now and there will be a renewal in a lot of things. We have rehabilitated all those schools, we put in laboratories and the other area we are looking into is to ensure that they have adequate equipment, because without equipment students cannot learn. Last year, we made an attempt to bring in about five construction companies to support us in providing some of the equipment. They are still working on that. We are hopeful that they will do something. They are the people doing most of the big construction work, such as Julius Berger, PW Nigeria Ltd that we patronize, and they should be able to give back to us as well.
When you came in 2007, you had your projection on enrollment in primary and secondary schools. How many children have you been able to enroll at the primary level so far?
That figure I cannot give you now, but I want to tell you that it has improved because most of our schools have been rehabilitated. We know, and we don’t shy away from the fact that, before now, our schools were not so good. But all over the state now, most of our schools are wearing a new look. Right now, we are delivering furniture to all our schools, just to make sure that there is access. Without the infrastructure, no parent will want to put his or her child in such schools. But now, I think it has improved. Even at the primary school level, people now bring their children from the private schools, but I cannot give you a definite figure.
Despite the improvement, the pupils, we are told, are still being asked to pay some fee…..
If you have any information that any of our schools is collecting fees, let me know. I don’t compromise on that, because this is a state that runs a free education programme. They (pupils) are not supposed to pay a kobo. That is why we provide the chairs and free textbooks in five core areas. Any school that is lacking in some things, we find out, put them in place and we do monitoring to ensure that those books are being used. Another target we are looking at is that, at the end of this session, at least, there should be a significant improvement in what is going on in the classrooms.
At the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) Award held in Abuja recently, people were amazed that Lagos did not get any prize. For a government that is generally believed to be performing, why are you finding it difficult to access the Federal Government funds?
Before we came in, some projects had been awarded, and in some cases, some contractors did not complete their projects. Even with some, we discovered that the structures were not too good and we had to demolish them. The state now had to reconstruct or rebuild those ones. Secondly, we had an issue on specification. In Lagos, land is gold to us. While they are building three or more classrooms in others states, we want to build more than that. It was not easy getting that Action Plan. It wasn’t easy getting the kind of building we want, but recently, we were informed by our Executive Chairman (of SUBEB) that they (UBEC) said we could bring our specification. We have told her (SUBEB Chair) to get that in black and white, so that we can follow it up.
Then, the cost of construction differs from one state to another. Look at the cost of materials in Lagos state, the cost of labour is quite different, so, you cannot standardise that for all the states. The cost of the project was also an issue. They (UBEC) will tell us, and those are issues we have at our own SUBEB, that with N10 million, we should build, for example, three classrooms. In another state, it could be N5 million, but in this state, it could be higher than that, so we have to look at that variance to enable us get quality job. We don’t compromise on quality, and that has been accountable for some of the problems in the past, because some of the contractors later came up and said that the contract fund was not adequate and they run away.
If we come to an agreement that this is the amount with which we can build here, it is left for you now to ensure that we comply with the due process and the monitoring, to ensure that the money is well spent. Those things are just coming up now and I intend to even lead a delegation to UBEC very soon to advocate for what we want to do, and by the time we trash out all the issues that are challenging both sides, we will move forward.
And the Chairman of our SUBEB often tell them (UBEC) that they should compare what we build here with those of other states that they have adjudged as best. The objectivity sometimes is not there. If they want to judge us, they should come and see what we have on ground.
Are you sure that there is no corruption in the execution of your projects because some contractors may claim to spend N10 million on a project, and you find out that some of the money ends up in their pocket?
There is due process. You know what processes are involved in getting any project? There is a bill of audit that has to be reviewed or assessed by even the UBEC officials themselves. When they go through that process, they agree. If it is too much, they sit down and say this cannot be. Even in contract processing, you have surprises. They should come down to Lagos and do a survey. That is when they will know whether there is over-pricing. They can’t just sit down in Abuja and come up with one price for all the states. The cost of living is quite different from one state to the other, so they have to take that into account.
For a state that runs free education, a lot of children are still out of school. How does the present administration intend to tackle this challenge?
I think this is a general phenomenon among the states. I have been going round and I have seen many students hawking. I think this is a functional problem and what has caused it is the economic situation. But we in Lagos state, through the Ministry of Poverty Alleviation, have been trying to address that. We have the Child Rights Law that has been passed, and part of that is access to education. So, what the ministry is doing now is to sensitize parents who have refused to allow their children to go to school, that there is a law in place. So, we are sensitizing to let them know that the schools are there, that the education is free, at least that basic education from primary 1 to JS3. The books are there and thank God, most of our local governments are even giving free uniforms, bags and sandals, because we discovered that many of them cannot even afford those basic needs.
On feeding programmes, some local governments still do that. It is quite daunting to do that, and we cannot go into something that we cannot sustain. We have to work out the logistics. What we did back then was a pilot survey. We felt it was something that will help enrollment, but we are still going to look at that. We want to get all the logistics right, but even the ones we are doing now, we still need the parents to bring in their children because we cannot go into their houses and bring the children out. We don’t want to start enforcing the law without adequate sensitization. When it’s the third offence, its three months imprisonment and we don’t want to imprison our people. So, it is better we let them know, especially when many of them will claim they are not literate and so they don’t know.
The Guardian |
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