Can Governor Okorocha Endorse Limitation of a Group’s Access to Education Facilities?

The need for all in a state to have equal access to education facilities cannot be halted because of the mostly exaggerated claims of a vociferous few.

Imo state’s apex political leadership cannot afford to renege on its earlier decision to permanently locate Imo State University outside the zone of the state capital, Owerri; if it does, it risks eating up most of its political capital given it by majority of the electorate on the ballot.

Injustice is hardly tolerated by any body, not even by the unjust, himself.

The senatorial zone of the state capital (Owerri) is already saturated with all tertiary academic institutions in the sate located in and around it. Regarding government’s decision to be fair to all through having Imo State University permanently located in Ogboko, outside Owerri zone, the concordant majority may be silent - but welcomed it. There should not have been much to haggle over a government’s decision to be fair to all sections of its territory. After all, who does not know that had Nigeria’s government decided to locate all tertiary institutions in the country in Lagos alone, in about two decades, the southwest area must have become educationally advantaged over the rest?


The tertiary education institutions in Imo state are: Federal University of Technology (FUTO), Owerri; Alvan Ikoku Federal College of Education (a degree awarding institution) Owerri; Imo State University (IMSU) Owerri; Federal Polytechnic, Owerri; Imo State Polytechnic - outside the state capital zone but a short distance from, and closest to Owerri than to any other large population centre in the state.

The presence of all these institutions in the state capital (Owerri) senatorial zone of 9 LGAS; and the absence of any university in the 12 LGAs of Imo West (Orlu) senatorial zone with a resident population of about 2.5 million people is scandalous. It has since breached international standards for location of tertiary education institutions in any area so populated aimed at educating its people as well as propagate the area’s culture and traditions among them. Okigwe zone of 6 LGAs, to some degree, benefits from Abia state University, Uturu, which is located very close to it.

As costs of food, transport and, above all, rent, are comparatively high in the zone of the state capital; and as larger numbers of people from the area can afford to attend tertiary institutions from their homes; in the last three and a half decades, Imo state has enacted the phenomenons of educationally advantaged area in Owerri zone, and a disadvantaged area in Orlu zone.

As they had petitioned his predecessors in office, hardly had Rochas Okorocha got sworn into office as Imo state governor when Orlu people marched straight to Government House, Owerri, demanding that a tertiary institution be sited in Orlu area. For an immediate take-off of such an institution, they pointed to a multi-facility, but now underutilised Skills Acquisition Centre, (once a campus of Alvan Ikoku College of Education) Orlu, whose facilities are enough to house many faculties and departments of a tertiary institution.

When buildings started going up in the proposed permanent site chosen by the present state government for Imo state University in Ogboko, Ideato south LGA - a short distance to the Orlu Skills Acquisition Centre - arguments from the vocal few against the location easily petered out. The arguments had to peter out because steps taken to remedy a glaring injustice against a group are usually not opposed by the majority in any good society.


Questions:
(1) Did Owerri-born former governor of Imo state, late Evan Enwerem, act in good faith when the government he led temporarily located Imo state University in Owerri, in the presence then, of FUTO and other three tertiary institutions in and around the town - with the absence of any tertiary institution in Okigwe and Orlu zones of the state? Note: then, there were other facilities in Orlu which could have accommodated IMSU.

(2) Now that Owerri zone is saturated with lots of tertiary institutions; and IMSU since housed in make-shift accommodation in Owerri is due for permanent location, what is wrong about having IMSU permanently located in Orlu zone with no university?

(3) On setting up the university’s teaching hospital at Orlu, Imo state government also set up an equally large and parallel Specialist Hospital in Owerri, a city which already has a multi-faceted Federal Medical Centre. How can any rationale fellow equate a teaching hospital that yearly takes in about 100 health sciences students to a multi-faculty university that admits thousands of students annually?

(4) If indeed the Imo state government led by former governor, late Sam Mbakwe, did pronounce that IMSU be sited in Aboh Mbaise/Ngor-Okpalla area, was there any law backing that? If not, must succeeding governments of Imo state be bound by a mere pronouncement of their predecessor? Lest we forget: In Orlu zone, the same Sam Mbakwe-led government mapped out a much more costly surface water supply scheme meant to supply most of the 12 LGAs in the now Imo West senatorial zone with running water, but that scheme was never built. It built similar running water schemes for Okigwe and Owerri. The same government sited a campus of Alvan Ikoku College of Education in Orlu, but despite the huge sum of money spent by it and the World Bank to renovate and expand the campus, it was closed down immediately after the administration; staff, students and property were moved to the main campus congested to the brim in the state capital.

MESSAGE TO IMO STATE GOVERNMENT.
(1)The Ogboko site chosen by Imo state Government for the permanent location of Imo State University is by no means less qualified than any other in the state. In that decision to locate IMSU in Ogboko, the state government took a just and irreproachable step to establish some degree of fairness toward all in Imo state.

(2) Imo state government cannot further impose on the already educationally disadvantaged people in Orlu zone another burdensome choice which a private university portends for them. Above all, more than a private university in Nigeria’s setting, a government-sponsored university, with its usual multi-faculty facilities provides larger population of people with wider variety of educational opportunities. A private university ceases operation whenever its proprietor is no longer able to carry it along.

(3) We are in a democracy; if for any reasons, government’s decision to permanently locate Imo state University in Ogboko can be subjected to a popularity test, let it be.

Benedict Okereke
obenok@hotmail.com