Excellence and Education Network

WAEC releases 2012 SSCE certificates

ExcedNetwork — Sat, 03 Aug 2013 16:37:31 GMT

Couresy: The Nation - www.thnationonline.net http://thenationonlineng.net/new/waec-releases-2012-ssce-certificates/

The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has released certificates for its Senior School Certificate Examination written in May/June for SS3 pupils, and November/December, for private candidates last year.

In a statement signed by the Deputy Director, Public Affairs, Mr Yusuf Ari, candidates who sat for the examinations up to last year were directed to collect their certificates from their former schools and WAEC Offices nationwide.

The statement also directed private candidates who wrote in previous years to collect their certificates by December 31 or risk paying extra to secure it afterwards.

"The Council also wishes to advise candidates who sat for previous diets of the November/December General Certificate of Education, Ordinary/Advance Levels (GCE O/A Levels), Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) (Private), WASSCE (Private), who have not collected their certificates to do so at WAEC zonal, branch or satellite offices, not later than December 31, 2013.

"Candidates who fail to collect their certificates after that date may be charged an extra fee for the custody of the certificates,” the statement said.

Why parents prefer private varsities

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 09 May 2013 12:03:52 GMT

Chilling truth from Prof. Ajienka’s observatory…

From CHRIS ANUCHA, Port Harcourt

Joseph Atubokiki Ajienka, the debonair Vice Chancellor of University of Port Harcourt (UNIPORT), is not a religious prophet but a professor of Petroleum Engineering, who though, 100 per cent home-trained, can hold his head high, anywhere in the world.

But in this interview with Education Review, he threw a bombshell when he predicted that, in a few years to come, private universities will take over the Nigerian education scene and relegate the federal and state universities to the background, the same way private nursery, primary and secondary schools are now doing in many parts of the country.

In this interview, he tells the reasons he feels so and what the government must do to reverse the ugly trend. He also talks about the standard of education and argues that it is not falling, as you may want to believe.

Excerpts:

Sir, tell us about yourself, your background.

I was born in 1955 and attended Okrika Boys School in Okrika, Rivers State, Government Comprehensive Secondary School, Borokiri, Port Harcourt and University of Ibadan for my first degree in Petroleum Engineering. I came to the University of Port Harcourt as Graduate Assistant and worked under the late Prof. Chi Ikoku, who, if you like, was the doyen of petroleum engineering in Nigeria.

I was privileged to work under him. Actually, there were two Ikokus, both of them are Chi Ikoku. The other one is Chimere, and he is Chukwu Ikoku or something like that. I learnt a lot from him; he was a quintessential teacher, very inspiring. He was an international scholar, known in the petroleum industry, worldwide, for his publications.

So, I decided to stay back and I did my Masters and PhD under him. From being a Graduate Assistant in 1982, combining academics and teaching, I rose through the ranks, to become a Professor in 2001. As I always say, I’m 100 per cent Nigerian content. I didn’t school outside the country, but I was privileged to be taught by people like him and Emmanuel Egbogah. These are international scholars that gave me the confidence and the foundation to practise.

I can say that in petroleum engineering, I can stand my ground anywhere in the world because of the improvement we’ve had, working with these scholars.

Though you said you would want this interview to be restricted to academics and not about your private life, one would like to know what it was like growing up. Are you one of those born with silver spoon?

I’m proud of my background. My father was a chief from Okrika. My childhood was sunny, I must say. I grew up with my grandmother and for a long while, I must tell you, it was my grandmother I knew. And then, of course, my mother was there. My mother’s two sisters had no children; as a result, they were quite supportive of my education in secondary school. I’m a child of many mothers; I grew up in the midst of many mothers.

That, also helped me to appreciate and value the relationship with these other mothers, even more than my biological mother. If they are strict, you must appreciate why they are strict. It was an interesting background and I enjoyed every bit of it.

Out of these ‘many mothers’, who among them impacted more on your life? All of them! As I said earlier, my childhood was with my grandmother. She was a very popular woman. She was one of the best palm wine sellers in Okrika. They knew her everywhere and I always followed her to all those markets, to everywhere she went. All her friends knew me. It was a very interesting phase of my development.

Looking at the standard of education in the country today, how will you compare the period you went to school and now?

I asked a question the other day at the Government House, where I chaired one of the sessions at the Education Summit. I asked if the standard of education was falling and most of the people said, ‘yes’. But is it the standard or the quality that we are talking about? We must make a clear distinction about this. In fact, it started in a workshop we organized here about quality assurance, where someone said the standard of our education is falling and it made me to think. And I reflected on this and realized that standards are the ones that are documented, the entry qualification, syllabuses and all that. They don’t change as such. If anything, standards have become higher.

Take for instance, the kind of mathematics we learnt in secondary school. When my little daughter comes home and, says, ‘daddy, they gave us this,’ sometimes I look at it and won’t understand anything and she would struggle with it and after a while, she would say, ‘daddy, I have solved it.’ When I was in her shoes, probably I wouldn’t have been able to think as fast. So, standards are even much higher now. I asked a question. How much of the mobile phones, handsets, do you know how to use? What percentage of it do you know how to use? I don’t think we can use five per cent.

But give it to your children, without anybody teaching them, by the time they manipulate it, you will be sorry that you are so ignorant about this. Think about the way they manipulate the television at home, the computer and the electronic gadgets. So whose standard is higher? When the computer started, I was teaching very experienced secretary on how to use the computer, the mouse and all that. She was afraid of using the mouse.

We are afraid of technology, of the new developments, but our children are not. They are in a digital age; they are used to multi-tasking. You may be sitting down with them and they have earphones in their ears, they are listening to music, they are playing around with handsets, doing all manner of things. So, standards are very high, electronic standards, digital standards are very high, which we parents cannot cope with.

There are many parents that depend on their children to manipulate their television, computer and Internet. Every time, my wife would call our son, ‘come and do this, come and do that for me.’ I would ask her, ‘if he goes back to school, who would do it for you?’ Standards are very high now. If you talk about quality of teaching, then, we can understand. So, quality, in terms of being fit for the purpose, has reduced, because of lack of commitment.

People are getting so tired about challenges and so on. People are not giving their best to what they do. Let me talk about the communication skill. In those days, those in Standard Two spoke very good English, they could read and write letters. These days, the quality of writing is so poor. Those are the things that people observe and say that standards have fallen. But actually, the standard of education is very high now.

You said something about lack of commitment. Is it on the part of teachers or students?

On the part of everybody! What is responsible for this? When I came here, I started out as a lecturer. We knew everybody by name. One of the pioneer graduates is Membere, he is Executive Director in NNPC now. We organized tutorials and graded them. We worked happily and gave the best of our time, power supply was not so much a challenge; chemical laboratory could accommodate the few pupils; that was the way it was at that time. Now, over time, the number exploded, everybody wanted to read Petroleum Engineering. There was so much pressure on the system, ‘admit’, ‘admit’, and so we admitted. Now, you don’t even know the names of your students.

When you give tutorials, they are so many that you are not able to mark the papers. And gradually, we started putting groups of people together, to work together. That, in itself, is a very vital part of training. In those days, undergraduates organized tutorial classes; they gave assignments, you could come together, one of you would solve a problem, the others would look at it and you discuss.

That was a very valuable process of education because you are building team skills. But now, all that has been eroded, the number of people, class size, has now become so unwieldy for some professional disciplines. Take people in Literature class, for instance; you cannot just give objective and think that the person has understood it. But the class size has become such that, when you give a long essay, a teacher is supposed to read it, correct and students will interact and improve. But when you now have a situation, where, instead of dealing with, maybe, 30 students, you have 100, how much time does the man have to read through and correct? These are some of the things that affect the quality of service delivery.

Even if you wanted to do it, the time is not there for you to concentrate to do so. It does appear to me that you are among those who clamour for more universities in this country, at least, to be able to reduce this pressure you talked about? You see, we don’t even have many universities like in some countries that are developing.

But this thing should be planned properly, in a systematic manner. It is not enough, with a fiat, to declare that we are going to have so, so, and so universities. Even when that has been done, some bit of planning must come into it.

Where are we going to get the lecturers? How are we going to recruit them? How many? What disciplines do we start with? We need access to education, we don’t even have enough universities. If you look at the number of candidates who write Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), and the percentage of people admitted every year, then, you will know that we have a huge gap. But it must be properly planned in such a way like, a strategic education plan.

We can say we need so, so, and so number of universities. Find out how many universities that are producing PhDs in a year; how many do we need? And gradually, we fill the gap. Are federal or state universities in any way, threatened by the proliferation of private universities in the country today? After the civil war, even before the war, in the Eastern Region, my alma mater, Comprehensive Secondary School, Borokiri, was one of the few government colleges. In fact, it was in a class of its own, because it was comprehensive.

We needed to do some bit of technical education, commercial and so on. People in Comprehensive Schools knew how to type, write in shorthand; we did woodwork, we did metalwork, technical drawing and so on. It was a bit more balanced than the Grammar Schools. Then, after the war, there were few government colleges. Every community, every town, had a major school. Okrika Grammar School, for instance, was a well-known school in the whole Niger Delta. The brother school was DMGS, Onitsha. These were missionary schools.

People used to come all the way from the present Bayelsa State, up to Niger Delta states, to attend Okrika Grammar School. Every town had some schools that it could reckon with. Then government took over everything. That was the beginning of the problem. Today, what is happening? They are giving them back. You give something that is dead back to the owner? No! I wished they had allowed missionaries to run the schools. What happened? Right before our eyes, by the time, we were finishing from Comprehensive, Federal Government colleges started. After a while, many people started trooping to Federal Government colleges because they were better funded. Then Federal Government Girls’ College, Abuloma started. Initially, there were no private nursery schools. If your child was in Township School, Port Harcourt, it was something else. But private nursery schools started and killed the likes of Township School, the best of public primary schools.

Why? It was a combination of so many factors. There was a time in this country that they were not paying teachers. You remember? NUT was on strike, one strike after the other. As a result, the commitment of the teachers reduced and people started withdrawing their children from those schools to private schools. After they dealt with the primary, next came the secondary schools. Private secondary schools started coming up and, of course, killed the likes of Comprehensive Government colleges. After the war, the first Aggregate Six in Rivers State was from Comprehensive Government College. The following year, another Aggregate Six, so, people were looking forward to aggregate six, to distinction.

Now, when the result started tumbling, of course, parents started taking their children to private schools – nursery, primary and secondary. Any parent that went to school wants the best for his child. So, it wasn’t surprising that there are now private universities.

What is happening is that, if you look at the total number of universities in the country – Federal, state and then, private, you and I know that a university like UNIPORT has a lot of assets. If you put value on the lecturers, professors, number of people who have PhDs, we have a lot to showcase! And for the lecturers, to convince them to go to the private schools, they will think twice. They will think they are more secured in the Federal university, than, maybe, in a private university. But I can assure you that from what I’m seeing, what happened to the government primary and secondary schools will happen with the private universities. Now, they are on the pages of newspapers, advertising.

The parents who are sending their children there are comparing the quality of education from the private universities. For instance, NUC (National Universities Commission) said they organized an examination for those who had First Class and Covenant University turned out to have higher percentage of people with First Class that scaled through the NUC test. These are important indicators that parents are looking at. So, my take on this is that, in the next few years, the public universities will face stiff competition from the private universities, but not all of them. There are some serious private universities or faith-based universities like Covenant, Redeemers University and so on.

When we get to that threshold where these universities also have the same quality of lecturers we have in the federal and state universities, you will find that many parents will be moving in their direction. When many parents start moving in that direction, then the real competition will begin.

The only way to continue to take the advantage of federal university, as it were, is funding. And the way it is, everybody knows government alone cannot fund higher education. We are seeing it; we are experiencing it. Unless a decision is taken to fund education properly, things may be much more difficult, may be, in the next 10 years. (to be continued next week).

VC laments varsities, agencies’ disconnect

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 09 May 2013 11:54:58 GMT

The Vice-Chancellor of the Niger State-owned Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBBU), Lapai, Niger State, Prof Ibrahim Kolo has accused development agencies and manufacturing industries of not utilising research findings by scholars from the nation’s Ivory Towers to fast track the country development.

Speaking during the university’s first inaugural lecture, the Vice- Chancellor noted that researches carried out in many areas of human endeavors with proven solutions by many scholars are abound but lamented that such findings are not being developed for the benefit of the country by our industries, development and government agencies.

Kolo said: ”In Nigeria, there is disconnect between what the universities are doing in the area of research and what development agencies are doing. Government is supposed to build on what the university researchers have done, but that is not the case. The fact is there can be no development without researchers input.

"IBBUL like other universities has the mandate to teach and carry out researches in various areas of human endeavour. The sad aspect is that our development agencies and industries are not utilizing these findings. In developed countries findings of researches carried out by their universities are improved upon, but here we are yet to do that”.

The don cited the feat recorded by the Federal University of Technology, Minna in developing Typhoid fever vaccine, but lamented that nothing has been done by various developmental agencies and companies on it after years of research and findings.

In order to remain relevant and in an effort to fulfill its mandate Kolo said that IBBUL lecturers, researchers and students are encouraged to carry out researches into areas of relevance to the state in particular and Nigeria.

In his 55-page lecture titled ”Mycotoxins: are they the silent killers,” Gbodi, a Professor of Toxicology noted that Mycotoxins have dealt a great havoc on the food sector of the economy, stressing that livestock and farm produce are worst hit, as it takes its toll on the health and economy of the people and country.

FG allocates N25 billion to tertiary institutions

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 21:54:14 GMT

The Minister of Education, Professor Ruqayyatu Ahmed Rufa’i, has announced the allocation of N25 billion as Special High Impact Project fund for tertiary institutions for 2012.

She made the announcement recently at the opening of the Annual Strategic Planning Workshop, organised by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), for Vice-Chancellors, Rectors, Provosts and other principal officers of federal and state universities, polytechnics and colleges of education, held at the National Universities Commission (NUC), Abuja.

Professor Rufa’i disclosed that 12 institutions had been selected for the 4th Phase of the special intervention on the principle of one university and one polytechnic or college of education per geo-political zone. Each university is allocated the sum of N3billion, while Polytechnics and Colleges of Education receive N1billion each. The funds, she said, shall be used for programme upgrade and improvement of the teaching and learning environment of the institutions.

The Minister reiterated government’s commitment to reinvigorating tertiary institutions to systematically upgrade the infrastructural and instructional facilities in order to encourage the training of high level manpower for the nation and eventual emergence of centres of excellence through the TETFund high impact intervention. She added that other institutions would benefit from the process, which is a continuous one.

While expressing delight at the steady increase in allocations to higher institutions over the years, the Minister noted that each university was to receive N598 million, while polytechnics and colleges of education would receive N339.5 million and N321 million, each, respectively, as regular intervention. She emphasised that the beneficiaries must understand that TETFund’s interventions need to be properly prioritised and applied to projects that directly add value to teaching, learning and research. She also called on the Fund to intensify its monitoring activities in order to ensure the effective implementation of both the regular and special interventions.

In his welcome address, the Executive Secretary, TETFund, Professor Mahmood
Yakubu, , tasked beneficiaries to target projects that were of utmost priority and put in place facilities that would be judiciously utilized in their institutions. He said benefiting institutions must submit two-year operational and five year-strategic plans as prerequisites for accessing the funds, as these would enable TETFund monitor their implementation.

Professor Yakubu advised them to be prudent and transparent in the management of funds and to review implementation every quarter, so as to determine grey areas, stressing that the funds are meant to build world class institutions in Nigeria.
In a goodwill message, NUC Executive Secretary, Professor Julius Okojie, said the Commission was collaborating with TETFund, to consolidate on quality assurance, disclosing that results of NUC’s accreditation visits to universities would henceforth be submitted to TETFund and used as a criterion for accessing the intervention funds.

He called on institutions to embrace good governance and proper handling of students’ records, as it was crucial to their effective functioning. In his words, "any university that has interim or denied accreditation status would not be allowed to embark on a new project until existing projects have been completed.”

Professor Okojie decried the habit of universities employing too many adjunct professors, warning that, very soon, NUC would embark on forensic audit of staff, students and programmes so as to flush out the bad eggs in the System.

Representative of the Chairman, Senate Committee on Education, Senator Atiku Bagudu, said the Senate was ready to provide the legislative framework to ensure judicious implementation of the funds.

Similarly, the Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Education Dr. (Mrs.) Rose Okoh, called for strict measures of monitoring and evaluation to ensure prudent expenditure.

The institutions benefitting in the 4th Phase intervention are: South West University of Lagos Federal Polytechnic, Ibadan South East Anambra State University, Uli Alvan Ikoku College of Education, Owerri South-South University of Calabar Delta State College of Education, Agbor. North West Kebbi State University of Science and Technology, Aliero Federal Polytechnic, Kaura- Namoda North East Modibbo Adama University of Technology, Yola Bauchi State College of Education, Azare North Central Benue State University, Makurdi Federal Polytechnic, Nasarawa

FG indicts SUBEBs of sabotaging basic education

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 21:52:44 GMT

The Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, was established to implement and monitor the federel government basic education programme.. To facilitate the programmes in the states UBEC boards were established in each state in Nigeria.

The law requires that intervention funds are sent directly to the SUBEBs to implement projects in primary and secondary schools.Recently the minister of state for education Nyesom Wike had cause to doubt the commitment of some SUBEBs to faithfully implement the pragramme in their states. DAVID AUDU reports on the minister’s frustration.

THE Minister of State for Education, Nyesom Wike has accused State Universal Basic Education Board Chairmen for the slow rate of implementation of the federal government Basic Education programme across the country.

Wike who lamented that while the federal government is committed to improving standards of basic education, state SUBEBS that are responsible for the implementation of the programme are frustrating it by refusing to use the funds released to them for the intended purpose, and sometime witholding the fund from the knowledge of their state authorities and governors.

Wike said every year the federal government disburses nothing less than five billion naira to each of the 36 states, including, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, for improving infrastructure, training and re-training of teachers at this level of education.

He said though education at this level is mainly the responsibility of the states and local government, the federal government in its desires to make quality education available and accessible to every Nigerian child is providing this intervention fund, but lamented that SUBEB is sabotaging the efforts.

It is either the money given to them are not released on time to execute projects or are not released at all, and the same people go to their state government to beg for fund to execute basic education projects.

I have also discovered that when the federal government releases these intervention funds to chairmen of SUBEBs they will not deem it appropriate to inform the Commissioners of Education onward to the governors. In most states the governors are even not aware that the federal government is giving them money.

Wike who spoke on a television programme recently said that by law the federal government is not allowed to give the money directly to the state government, and therefore stressed that until the law establishing SUBEB is amended, UBE programme may not achieve its desire results.

Hear him: "I can tell you that F G spends not less than five billion naira every year in the training and re-training of teachers. I can also give you an example of a state. I have told you that this job does not require you to sit in your office, you must go out and see things for yourself.

"You can't believe what happened 'recently' and the governor of Akwa Ibom was shocked. When I paid him a curtesy call, I said in this year we have released fund for the training and re-training of your teachers, last year we released so so amount for the same purpose. He was jolted, and he looked left and right, and he said can I repeat what I have just said.

By the time I finished, he asked for the SUBEB person and somebody got up. And I asked, did the federal government send money last year for training? He said, yes; did the federal government send money this year for training? He said, yes. Where is the money, I asked?

"The law does not allow us to disburse directly to the coffers of state government. The law says this money must be paid into the accounts of SUBEBS, whose officials are appointees of state government.

"This is a sabotage against the efforts of the federal government.

"And the Akwa Ibom Governor said he can't believe that the federal government has been sending money for the training of teachers and you can't tell even the commissioner of education".

Wike explained further that all the while the state government has been funding the training and re-training of teachers.

Dr. Godswill Akpabio said through the office of the Head of Service that teachers are being trained, and he said this would be an eye opener for most of the state governors.

The minister also disclosed that when he visited the former governor of Bayelsa State, Sylva, and told him that the federal govern-ment had released N150 million for the train-ing of teachers for the year, he was sur-prised and called for the state SUBEB chair-man and asked: "when did F G release this money, three months ago", the chairman an-swered. Three months ago and I am not aware, and the commissioner for education is also not aware", the governor was angry, the minister said.

"Wike explained that the law requires that this money must not be given directly to the governors, that it must pass through the state UBEC, it is their responsibility to inform the appropriate organ of the state executive for them to be aware that the fed-eral government has sent some money for the training of teachers in their state.

Now if our efforts are not being comple-mented, if there is no commitment that these funds are being utilised for the purpose it has been given, what happens? he asked.

He lamented that if one look at the com-mitment of the federal and vision in making sure that funds are released to the states for training of teachers, who are employees and paid by the states, not that somebody sits somewhere to sabotage our efforts be-cause there is loop hole in the law.

"He said such situation would no longer be accept-able, the federal government is seeking an amendment of the UBEC Act, because when we give money we also want to sanction if it is not properly used.

If that is not done, obviously, all the ef-fort we are making would be in vain. We
can't just fold our hands and watch our efforts go down", he said.

"We have been going from state to state so that all the stake holders are aware of what we are doing."

The minister also spoke on ways to revamp the Unity Schools across the country. He said the government is committing a lot of fund to bring them to the required standard, but cautioned that the work cannot be done in one year.

He assured that government is well aware that the standards in the schools are not what they were before, and disclosed that government has mapped out plans to bring back their glory.

Some of these plans, he explained, include the construction and equipping of well stocked library, laboratory and decent hostel accommodation, while the training of teachers continues.

He said the idea of the library was to lure both students on and off campus to read, thereby improving their reading culture and their performance in public examination.

"Initially, the said, government would start with about 30-35 schools each year, as fund is made available, "so that by 2015 we would have touched about 90 percent of the schools".

On motivation of teachers in the Unity Schools, Wike said, the first step was to address the anomaly of the existence of casual teachers. He disclosed that government has approved the regularisation of the 1,350 casual teachers into full employment, stressing that you can't expect any measure of commitment from workers who have been on the same level and salary for the past 10-15 years.

Nigerian is first African to earn first class in Malaysian Varsity

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 21:49:00 GMT

Nigerian and indigene of Sokoto State, Muftahu Jibrin Salihu Goronyo from Goronyo Local Government Area has emerged the first African to graduate with a first class in Master of Educational Leadership and Management of the University of Southern Queensland, Australia, but based in Malaysia.

Accordingly, Goronyo’s academic excellence fetched him two separate offers from different universities, including an automatic admission and scholarship by his university to undergo a three-year Ph.D programme between 2012 and 2015.

A congratulatory letter signed by Jim Campbell, Senior Media Co-ordinator of the university stated: "Firstly I can say a big congratulations on your upcoming – You should be very proud of this achievement. Besides bagging a first class degree, you are the only African student in the upcoming graduation, above all, the only Nigerian student who graduated from the university since its inception in 1971.”

The 26-year old must, however, serve the university for 10 years upon graduation until 2025. The Nation gathered that, Goronyo had turned down the offer for the love of Nigeria and patriotism.

The second offer of automatic admission by Ahia e-University, based in Malaysia, came open to Salihu but without scholarship.

However, his elder brother Alhaji Mohammed Umar who is also the General Manager of the Sokoto state newspaper company, appealed to well-spirited individuals in the state and government to sponsor his postgraduate studies.

"He should be sponsored to complete the Ph.D degree for three years as he wants to come back to Nigeria and serve the state and the nation after his graduation in 2015,’’ he said. The Nation

FEC approves N7b for procurement of 16m textbooks for primary schools

ExcedNetwork — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 20:48:30 GMT

The Federal Executive Council on Wednesday approved the purchase of 16 million textbooks and library resources materials for distribution to all public primary schools and Junior Secondary Schools across the country.

The Minister of State for Education, Mr. Ezenwo Wike, stated this in Abuja while briefing State House Correspondents on the outcome of the weekly FEC meeting which was presided over by Vice-President Namadi Sambo.

He said the textbooks would be for core subjects in English Language, Mathematics, Basic Science and Technology and Social Studies for primaries three, four, five and six.

He said the library resources materials would be distributed to all Junior Secondary Schools across the country.

"You will agree with me that part of the transformation agenda of Mr. President is that education is core and in its resolve to improve the quality of education particularly at the basic level, Council today approved the procurement of core subjects in primary three, primary four, five and six for all public primary schools in this country and again for JSS for all the public schools.

"Now, the total number of books Council approved for purchase through UBEC is 16 million copies of textbooks in Mathematics, English language, Basic Science and Technology, Social Studies, while 1,010,100 library resource materials (were) being approved for JSS,” he said.

According to him, 5,746,489 of the textbooks in English Language, Mathematics, Basic Science and Technology would be for primary four, 5,151,450 for Primary Five, 2,568,700 for Primary Six and 3,222,210 social studies textbooks for Primary Three.

The minister stated that the distribution of the textbooks would not be based on equality of states, but rather it would be based on number of enrolment of pupils in the states.

He, however, maintained that the 1,010,100 library resources materials would be shared equally among the 36 states of the federation and the FCT.

Also addressing the correspondents, Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, said the Council approved the execution of three infrastructural development projects in the Niger Delta region.

He stated that the projects included the construction of Kira- Dere –Mogho road in Gokona Local Government Area of Rivers and land reclamation/shore protection at Ogbeinana town in Bomadi Local Government Area of Delta.

Maku expressed Federal Government’s commitment to create the necessary atmosphere and the environment conducive to sustainable development of the Niger Delta.

Source: Punch