A lecturer at the Centre for Educational Media Resource Studies, University of Ibadan, Nigeria, Dr. Fadekemi Oyewusi, has said any nation that wants to succeed must take the establishment of libraries very serious.
According to her, the concept of school library is like the proverbial old win in a new skin.
Speaking during a faculty lecture of the faculty of education titled “NEW WINE IN AN OLD WINE SKIN, THE TRAJECTORY OF SCHOOL LIBRARIES IN NIGERIA”,
Oyewusi chronicled the reading culture of an average Nigerian child, revealing how she grew up in the 80’s and how she fell in love with reading through the mentorship of her late dad.
On the death of reading culture among Nigerian youths, she suggested modern tools and methods to reawaken reading habit, advising government to interfere by legislating the establishing a functional and well funded and equipped library in every school to further improve the reading culture.
He also identified lack of funding, epileptic power supply, unavailability of proper ICT infrastructure among others as some of the problems militating against reading culture in the country.
She, however, opined that for Nigeria to attain the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), libraries have critical role to play as young people are given access to information devoid of dichotomy and discrimination.
