100 Days in Office: Gov Okpebholo Targets Renovation, Reconstruction of 100 Schools

By Simeon OSAJIE

The Executivve Governor of Edo State, Senator Monday Okpebholo has disclosed an ambitious plan to renovate and reconstruct 100 dilapidated structures in public schools, both primary and secondary, across the state ahead of his symbolic 100 days in office.

The Chairman, Edo State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), Mrs. Onomen Goodness Brigg revealed this when she, accompanied by the member representing Edo South on the Board, Mrs. Angela Okpamen, visited some of such schools.

The team appealed to communities, parents and residents where these schools are located to help check vandalism of the facilities and informed them that Governor Okpebholo was already including fencing of all the schools his administration would work on.

Schools visited by Brigg included Ebo Primary School in Iyekhogba and Ore-Oghene Primary school, both in Oredo local government area, and Evbareke Junior Secondary School, Use Junior Secondary School and Okhekhugbo Primary school in Egor local government area where she assured that all the renovation and reconstruction works would be competed between one week to three weeks.

According to her, “Security is one major issue we have to look into and we also have to sensitise the communities so that they can put an eye on these properties because the children are the ones that will suffer if these facilities are destroyed, or if these thefts and vandalism continue.

“So, we need to sensitise the people and the community, everybody involved; the teachers, and the pupils and students so that if they see anything they can say something. Fences are part of the security arrangements, so we are also going to make sure that these schools have fences and security posts so that you can only come into the compound through the security post into the school. This is also key to us and the governor has already started. Most of the construction going on, fencing is part of what he is looking at. 

“We did five today, we have a hundred currently going on all across the state. We are going to Edo Central and Edo North within the week. The construction and the renovation include furnishing, so the chairs and the tables are already part of it. You can’t put a new wine in an old wine skin so you can’t get new chairs and tables and put them in a dilapidated building so we need the buildings to be good and okay then furniture can go in.

“Some of them will be completed in one week, some less than a week, and then two weeks, and maximum three weeks”. 

It was observed that in many of the schools visited, the pupils lacked furniture as many sat on the floor while some were overcrowded with about 200 students of four arms using one classroom.