Our students’ lives, property are in danger – Anambra Principal tells contractor

Chinedum Treasure

The Principal of Union Secondary School, Agulu in Anaocha Local Government Area of Anambra State, Mrs S.U Onyebuchi has raised the alarm over threats to lives of students of her school following porosity of the school compound.

She appealed to the contractor awarded the contract for the construction of fence round the school to come and execute the job.

The Principal made the appeal when ProjectTrust Community of Practice, CoP member, Jane Ejim Kenechukwu visited the school to track the implementation of the fencing project.

ProjectTrust, implemented by Connected Development, (CODE), with the support of MacArthur Foundation, is aimed at addressing trust deficit between the government and the people by restoring citizens’ confidence in their government.

The project, which runs under the theme “Deepening and institutionalizing accountability, social inclusion systems, and processes to promote resilience and sustainability in governance across Nigeria”, is being piloted in six states across all the geo-political zones.

The fencing contract marked ZIP2024068 was awarded at the cost of thirty million naira (N30,000,000.00), under the Zonal Intervention Projects otherwise known as constituency projects.

While half of the total contract sum (fifteen million naira) had been paid to the contractor, visit by ProjectTrust revealed that no fencing project has started in the school.

Commenting on the situation, the Principal, S.U Onyebuchi said she learnt of the project award since the beginning of third term, which just ended.

She said, “Every day you are chasing the students around the school. They come into the school and go out at will, enter into the bush. There is no how we would start pursuing them.

“We have only two male teachers here. How do female teacher run after these number of students? We will be greatly relieved if the government will ensure that this project it has awarded is executed.

“Lives and school property are endangered, hence the decision to keep the property far away from the school.

“Apart from students, every other person comes into the school without hindrance. It is not good for security. That is why the moment the school is over, everyone is running to go home.

“Some teachers would have loved to stay after school to write their lesson notes and do some other things, but, because the school is not fenced, they leave in a hurry. No doubt, it is affecting our efficiency”.

“I took things like laptops, fridge, generator, plasma television to my house while there are a few with the former PG. You can imagine what we do when we need those things for learning. It is either we learn without them or we go home to retrieve them. It is not easy at all.”

Project Trust noticed an old dwarf fence which had existed before the project for the new one was awarded by the Federal College of Agriculture, Ishiagu, under the Federal Ministry of Agriculture.

Some of the students, who spoke in confidence shared their fears with the porosity of their school premises, especially at a critical time like this.

“While we thank the Federal Government for awarding the project, we appeal to them to bring the contractor to come and execute the project. It will help to boost security in our school. We have been learning in fear of the unknown.

“We also call on the contractor, who had collected half of the money for the contract to come and help us to fence our school,” one of the students appealed.

Reacting, the ProjectTrust State Support Officer, Uju Ananwude, described the situation surrounding the fencing project at the Union Secondary School Agulu as a clarion call on the Senator representing Anambra Central Senatorial District, Chief Victor Umeh, the House of Representative member, community leaders in Agulu as well as management and Parents-Teachers Association PTA to work towards ensuring that the project is implemented.

“If not for anything, for the good purpose the fencing project was meant to achieve, let them work together especially stakeholders from Agulu. When it is done, there will be greater efficiency in teaching and learning in the school,” Ananwude said.

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