The proposed capital of Ogoja State is meant to be in Ogoja. If Ogoja State is ever created, my wife, my children and I, will all be proudly from Ogoja State. Bonafide indigenes by all parameters, so I will not keep quiet over this matter.
Ogoja, which is proposed to be our capital, currently has 28 secondary schools for instance, including the ones in the refugee camp in Adagom. These 28 schools have an approximate student enrollment of over 8000 with Government Technical College in Abakpa, Government Secondary School Igoli, and Government Science College Ishibori, leading the chat.
Due to the previous moratorium on civil service hiring, 90% of the less than 300 teachers are all on level 14 and above and are vice principals or principals who are not supposed to be classroom teachers. Some rural areas have only one science teacher that teaches all the science subjects in all the classes.
These 8000 plus students in 28 schools have less than 300 teachers, with only six of the schools properly staffed. Namely: Government Secondary School, Igoli, Government Girls College, Igoli, Government Science College, Ishibori, Government Technical College, Abakpa, Army Day College, Igoli and Ntol Comprehensive School, Ndok.
Schools and communities have resorted to using what they refer to as “PTA Teachers” to augment and ensure the schools stay in session, lest they would have collapsed. The PTA teachers are paid 20k monthly from the PTA levies and philanthropic donations. But most Principals hoard and steal the PTA levies, so there is no hiring.
The last time the state government announced that they would hire civil servants, 200 slots were allocated to the education sector but greedy politicians immediately hijacked and populated the available spaces with their cronies that know nothing about the education sector.
How have our leaders grappled with the very simple things that do not require the creation of Ogoja State before they can be achieved? How can this bride enter the fattening room and prepare herself for the marriage?
For example, N67,200,000 (sixty seven million two hundred thousand), can hire 280 PTA teachers for one year, at 20k each and distribute 10 each to the 28 schools in Ogoja. That’s one of the ways to secure our future. Not State creation. But those masturbating our emotions with State creation today will rather raise multiples of that amount to celebrate burials and ceremonies (our past), rather than securing our future. The politicians will steal multiples of that mount in one fell swoop and still come to tell you that it is because Ogoja State hasn’t been created that we are still behind. Tufiakwa!
If what I am saying is paining you, no vex. Just provide answers for me.
Can we now begin this conversation?
Citizen Agba Jalingo is the Publisher of CrossRiverWatch and a rights activist, a Cross Riverian, and writes from Lagos.
NB: Opinions expressed in this article are strictly attributable to the author, Agba Jalingo, and do not represent the opinion of CrossRiverWatch or any other organization the author works for/with.
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