By Lukman Ismail
The education Sector and the future of thousands of innocent Secondary School Students in Kwara State is in dire straits as the State Universal Basic Education Board has chosen to be a clog in the wheel of progress of Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrasak’s poise to put Kwara on the World map in the development of the education sector in Kwara State.
Aside the Hijab crisis in the state, there is another squabble, which if not properly managed, may degenerate to the level where our darling Kwara State may again be in the news for the wrong reason. As a way of providing a background to the crisis being fueled by SUBEB, it is imperative to state that before the Federal Government introduced the new Education Policy of 9-3-4 as against the 6-3-3-4, the Senior Secondary Schools (JSS 1 to SSS 3) were being managed by the Teaching Service Commission with the appointment of Principals, Teaching and Non-Teaching Staff while Primary Schools (Primary 1 to 6) were being managed by the State Primary Education Board).
With the introduction of the 9-3-4 policy by the Federal Government, Primary Schools, from Primary 1 to 6 and the first three (3) years basic education (JSS 1 to 3) fell under the control of SUBEB and are now being monitored by the Local Government Education Authority (LGEA) while the Senior Secondary Schools (SS 1 to 3) fell under the authority of the Teaching Service Commission (TESCOM).
Based on this new arrangement, SUBEB staff were instructed to take charge of all Junior Secondary Schools in the State with the appointment of Principals, Teaching and Non-Teaching staff from SUBEB while TESCOM staff had no choice than to accommodate the SUBEB staff in the Senior Secondary Schools in the State. The development also led to some Primary Schools being upgraded to Junior Secondary Schools.
However, few years after this arrangement, it was observed that some of these Primary Schools started operating Senior Secondary Schools on their own without approval but the Ministry of Education later descended on them and scrapped their illegal SSS Schools.
Precisely in the year 2020, the host communities of these newly upgraded schools sought for approval from TESCOM to run Senior Secondary Schools and this was granted in their respective domains after due consideration. In Ilorin West Local Government alone, about 25 communities were given official approval to run Senior Secondary Schools alongside with Junior Secondary Schools. Subsequently, TESCOM sent their staff to these newly upgraded Senior Secondary Schools. However, the problem started because the SUBEB staff were instructed by the Education Secretary of Ilorin West precisely not to allow TESCOM staff to operate in their domain because they were formerly and illegally in charge.
This in addition, she asked the newly upgraded SSS section to immediately vacate their structures (class rooms) and hand over all the schools’ properties to their respective Junior Secondary Schools Principals. The L.G.E.A Secretary in Ilorin West in particular was even moving around to enforce this sanction and even confront these new Principals for compliance to her order. Thereafter, she has sent circulars to all the affected schools with ultimatum of November 2022.
Seeing this negative development, the stakeholders in the Education sector called for an urgent meeting so as to address the problem. These include; representative of the Ministry of Education, Chairmen TESCOM, SUBEB, PTA, PRINCIPALS, representatives from affected communities etc. but all to no avail.
At this stage, it is important to draw the attention of Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq to this ugly incident and for his quick intervention so as to save our Education sector from the danger it may pose to us most especially at this time when we are still battling the setback the hijab crisis has caused in the state.
It is instructive to conclude that the future of innocent school children being denied access to education in the affected schools is in danger and the implications would no doubt be a setback to the affected communities. It may also interest the Governor that the school children may not be the only ones affected in this lingering crisis but the teachers of the affected schools would also be caught up in the limbo.
The following questions thus suffice:-
A- what is going to be the fate of these innocent students?
B- what would also be the stand of the affected communities?
C- Will there be no negative reactions from the TESCOM that accommodated SUBEB’s Junior Secondary Schools during the segregation?
D- Are these innocent students non Kwarans or not the students of the affected communities?
The above postulations are germane for the Governor and others in the State’s education sector to ponder on.
Ismail sent this piece from Ilorin, Kwara State
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