The All Progressives Congress in Oyo state has lamented what it described as unacceptable and worrisome, the downward slope which virtually all the key sectors of the economy, including education, have been experiencing since the administration of Governor Seyi Makinde came on board in 2019.
Oyo APC’s lamentations came against the backdrop of the orchestrated delisting of about 50 secondary schools by the West African Examination Council (WAEC) on account of established cases of sharp practices recorded during the conduct of the 2022 exit examinations involving candidates of the affected schools which spread across the state.
In a statement issued over the weekend and made available to journalists in Ibadan by its Publicity Secretary, Olawale Sadare, the opposition party emphasized that the delisting of 50 schools by WAEC was unprecedented, as it was a clear manifestation of rot in the system and the gloomy future awaiting the state if nothing was done to urgently arrest the very ugly situation.
“Little did the people realize that Oyo state had gotten into the wrong hands when the present PDP administration of Gov. Seyi Makinde began to paint a picture of success in the education sector at an early stage, when they ought to have outlined policies and programmes capable of improving the standards they met on ground. Unfortunately, Gov. Makinde and some of his sponsored agents went to town to mislead the world with wrong information.
“At a point, they repeatedly fed the world with lies about people from the United Kingdom, United States, Canada among other developed nations bringing their children and wards for enrolment into Oyo state schools, because according to them, the superman in the governor had turned all the public primary and secondary schools into ivy league colleges, when in fact, the only thing done was the sensational cancellation of N1,000 per term payment by students in secondary schools – a lofty idea initiated by the Abiola Ajimobi administration to aid the laudable activities of the School Governing Boards. The Makinde government’s inability to sustain funding of the state secondary schools through its refusal to provide grants is perhaps the biggest advert of its problems in the sector.
“The Makinde administration would do well by saving the public the ubiquitous noise of prompt payment of monthly salaries to school teachers, when critical infrastructure, personnel training and retraining, effective control and supervision as well as funding are lacking. We have also observed that suitable persons are not allowed to run the affairs of the education ministry in the state, while the consultant imposed on tertiary institutions does more harm to the system, than good. Unfortunately, it is common knowledge that Mr. Governor is a great fan of his consultant, and isn’t ready to ring any changes, at least not very soon.
“Much as the population of pupils increase everyday, there are no new classrooms, as most of the new structures around were either built by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), or facilitated from Abuja by federal lawmakers, and influential individuals like Dr. Yunus Akintunde, our party’s Oyo Central Senatorial Candidate. Most public schools are littered with hemp-smoking miscreants who make incursions at will, with teachers and students exposed to danger unnecessarily.
“Lastly, while we commiserate with the governor over this downward slope, we urge him to bury the idea of making heads of the affected schools scapegoats, because everyone, including the governor, knows they are not largely responsible for the embarrassing development which portends gloom for the future of our dear state. If anything, the PDP administration should blame itself and be courageous enough to immediately organize an Education Summit where all the problems would be discussed and ways forward proffered.” Sadare stated.
