Edo State governor, Godwin Obaseki, on Sunday, said his administration plans to spend about N6 billion to rebuild secondary schools in the state within the next 16 months.
Obaseki, who disclosed this while responding to questions from journalists shortly after the closing ceremony of the 2023 Edo education week in Benin City, said it is a step towards addressing the infrastructural deficit in secondary schools.
The governor further said that rebuilding secondary schools in the state became imperative owing to the lack of the Federal Government’s support in secondary schools, unlike basic and junior schools which have several aid mechanisms.
“Between now, May 1 and September 1, next year, all the funding I used to put under State Employment and Expenditure for Results (SEEFOR) project for roads will now go into secondary schools and this is in excess of N6 billion for secondary schools alone. This is because unlike basic schools and junior school, we don’t have federal support for secondary schools.
Read also: FG to concession State House Wildlife Sanctuary, others
“We have Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) supporting State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB). But for secondary schools, there is no support, so we now need to put up funding mechanism to rebuild all our secondary schools. We can’t finish all of them but we have started by having a financing plan”.
He explained that his administration’s plan was to leave a standard educational system capable of training students with appropriate skills that will be needed for life after school.
“I think it is unfair to expect that in five or eight years we would have solved the problems that had accumulated for more than two or three generation. What we have done is to start the process, set the direction and to hope that the citizens will hold the government accountable and responsible to ensure that they deliver on what they expect within available resources.
“I believe that what we should leave behind is a well-articulated plan, a directional plan on what needs to be done and when. It is humanly impossible to rebuild all the classrooms put furniture in all the classrooms and have all the textbooks as we required.
“It is a work in progress, we have started, we have made significant progress and have demonstrated that it is possible and not rocket science. We expect that the last phase of the project is to be able to have measures for learning outcomes. So, we have done all this, we have made the investments, and we have hired all the teachers,” Obaseki added.
