As Igbo land burns Igbos are busy focusing on Yoruba land and their schools are dilapidated


Abia School for the Blind serves both Abia and Imo states. It haswell over a 100 pupils in residence as at the time of my visit.


“Ermm… we teach them Mathematics But the math equipment we don’t have enough. We are supposed to be using tailor frames and tiles,” the school official I spoke with responded after I asked if the students are taught Mathematics.

I asked how the students and teachers are able to work together then and the official casually says they manage what they have. Unfortunately, the shortage is hampering effective learning.

“They use their brain oh,” the official tells me, answering my query as to how the students write math exams.

Keeping with the tradition of schools in Enugu, teachers here read to the students during exams. Theschool owns at least two embossers but the principal says there are no operators to make them function. When I broached the subject of government’s help in getting more learning materials, a cough echoes.

“No government here oh,” the official says in a small voice. “Government here don’t pay. It is individuals and churches that give us the little support we have to feed the children, to take care of them.”

I checked my mental notes and asked if this was a state owned institution, a chorus of chuckles pre-empts the response.

“I have not received my February salary of this year, I received only January, likewise some of the teachers here who belong to School Basic Management Committee.In this school, all fingers are not equal. Staff from the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board, had not been paid since April, while those employed by the state ministry of education have it rosy.”

The official has been in the school for three years and says the government has only provided subvention once.

“Since 2016 that I resumed work here, it is only last year November that they gave us subvention,” they said.

The School for the Blind, Umuahia, has a remedial programme as well. The officials tell me theirs is a two-year course. Most of the male students have proceeded to Government College Umuahia for their secondary school education. It is the Alma mater of my guide in Abia State, Wisdom Kalu, who is the chairman of the Nigerian Association of the Blind in the State.

Constructed in the 1920s, the school still has wooden flooring. Its old boys have reached a deal with the Abia State government to take over the school and are slowly draining out all students admitted by the government.

It has two sets left and there is only one blind pupil in the schoolwhen we arrived. Our interaction is, however, with the school’s low-voiced resource teacher. There is no variation to the nature of learning for the 20 students she had upon assumption of her current position. The students had no care for maths, they studied without textbooks,they have their question papers read to them during internal exams, seek the aid of their resource teacher for external ones – where braille is provided and had almost no taste of ICT training.

Kalu, however, informs the teacher that NAB attracted the donation of a few computers to the school. He requests to know if the PCs, which are to be used for the ICT update of the students is in safe storage.

“I am not aware of it,” she replies.


Pay more, get less

At Holy Ghost College, a Catholic mission school in Umuahia, I met Tochi, one of two blind students in the school. Tochi’s parents remit N46,000 per term to procure quality education for their child from the institution.

Even though their son is one of the few children paying fees to obtain an education in the three states of the South-East I visited, his training is no different from what those who attend classes free receive. So, what does Tochi do during math class since he cannot escape to the Resource Room like I did in secondary school?

“I just relax and listen to what they are saying,”

The school has almost no consideration for this pupil. He is forced to abandon the use of his typewriter in class, because he does not type as fast as the sighted write with their pen.

“If I make use of typewriter, they will tell me I’m delaying them. By the time I meet up, their own has finished. I don’t have much time to write. That is why somebody will tell me the question, I will answer, then he or she will jot it down.”

The youngster is not bothered about the quality of education he is receiving – he knows no better. His pain, however, is with the feeling of alienation he gets in class, especially during impromptu tests.

“Sometimes, I feel so bad. If they are taking test, I will be looking at them. I do not get to write many tests.”

Before Tochi arrived at the principal’s office where I was waiting, a staff had prepared my mind to expect the neglect. After a rambling lecture on how special students should be educated, the official informedme that his institution does not have any of those in place


Rejection – the easy way out

The state government-owned William Memorial has had no blind student in school in a long while. The school officials had maintained the status quo.

“Before I came, those that were here had already graduated. One or two persons came, I told them that we don’t have the facilities here— that whoever wants to keep you here is just trying to deceive you. In a winding conversation, the official tells me the Abia State government ought to create a secondary school for the blind.

“Here, because they are in the normal school, during exams students write for them. I am a Christian, I cannot condone that kind of exam malpractice. If they want this school to take blind students, they should equip this school.”

The school refused admission to five students. Kalu confirmed to me in a phone call after I had left that he traced four of the five students to schools in Imo and Anambra.

Leaving the presence of the frustrated but passionate official at William Memorial, I met with Reverend Jane Samuel, the principal of Holy Rosary Secondary School.

She is frustrated with the services rendered by the state government to the blind pupils in her school. The thought of turning them back has not occurred yet. Telling me why her students are not numerically literate she says, “They tell us what they can do and what they cannot. Even in WAEC they don’t offerMaths. That is why we call them ‘special students.’ They know their capacity.”

Her explanation not sufficient for me, I tell her it is the school who should expand the minds of the students.

“If I have a special teacher, I will know a lot about them,”she rebuts. “During the takeover of schools by the church, I visited the ministry several times to give me a special teacher and they couldn’t give me. In that case, there was nothing we could do.” We are thinking of asking the government not to post them here since we don’t give them much services.”

Her students – five girls, receive free tuition but have to pay boarding fees. Two are fee-paying students, while the other three are sponsored by the state government. She says she has not received any payment for students who come to the institution through the government since Governor Okezie Ikpeazu assumed office.

“The government is playing pranks on us,” she complains. “We want to go and tell them, ‘Look, it is better you come and take your students,” she says.


What has government done?

Under UBEG grants, Abia has been allotted N12.66bn worth of funding since 2005. As at July 22 2019, the state had received N9.67bn, leaving N2.99bn unclaimed because of default in its counterpart contribution.

For persons dependent on UBEC funding for special education in the state, N253.13m is what they should receive if the state makes a full claim on all funds available to it, N193.36m is what these school centres should have received through the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board for various projects and N59.78m is what they will be unable to access till the state government provides the matching grant to UBEC.

The official at School for the Blind, Umuahia says she has not received a coin from UBEC or its state equivalent. While I was unable to reach Okechukwu Ananaba,the chairman of the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board, I got through to the head education services in the Abia State ministry of education, Victoria Adindu, who chose not to comment or facilitate a response.

The details of the Abia State 2019 budget is not as spelt out as that of Enugu State. The School for the Blind, Umuahia, is not listed anywhere on the budget document I found. Under the Ministry of Special Duties is a heading called vulnerable groups. This heading received a budgetary allocation of N71.08m. It is unclear, however, if this is where funds that should go to School for the Blind, Umuahia, comes from.


A curse to be blind in Imo State

Of all the states I visited, Imo, it appears, is the worst place to be struck with blindness. When Abia and Imo states were one, a school that catered to the learning needs of blind and deaf students existed in Orlu.


The creation of Abia State, saw blind students migrate to Umuahia – the capital of Abia while the school in Orlu now attends to the deaf alone. The only route to rehabilitation in the state is the Anglican Church-run vocational centre in Akpodim, Mbaise local government, where blind persons are valued enough to learn how to make brooms and old-fashioned baskets.

Trainees, some of whom have been there for nine years, say they are counting meals. Chiderah is the youngest student I spoke with.She has been at the centre since she left school in 2017. In that time, no one has taught her how to make brooms, baskets or manipulate cane into different furniture.

“My brother, I don’t see anything I’m learning here. Since I got here, I’ve been hearing that they are learning how to make beads, brooms, chairs and other things but I’ve not seen anyone to teach us.”

The centre said it teaches its trainees braille reading and writing as well as typewriting. Uche has made the centre his home for nine years now. In that length of time, he said he has seen typewriter instructors just once.

“We have some machines here. Some typewriter machines. But there’s nobody to teach us how to use it. Since nine years I have been here, only once they come. They stay like four weeks before they go.”

Another trainee I spoke to, addressed by everyone in the centre as ID, said whatever training offered in the centre is archaic and of little monetary value. He gave truth to young Chiderah’s information, saying “Well, I can say that we are abandoned. As you see, they came to our hostel to get us, you would not have had to send somebody to call us, because we are there in our shop.”

Mr. Angus Owunzurike has been the secretary of a committee set-up to look after the centre for three years. I told him of Chiderah’s two wasted years and Uche’s nine years in the centre, with just four weeks of typewriting training. He says the school has been without instructors for a long time. According to him, the last resident instructors furthered their education and took up better job offerings. He says the centre has so far been unable to attract instructors to its rural-location.

“We are still using those we’ve trained there to train the other ones,” he says. Stating how dire affairs at the centre are he says, “If we can get the instructors from anywhere to teach.” There is one glitch however. “We have to hire them with money and we don’t have much. “

UBEC reserves two per cent of the basic education funds for each state of the federation for the needs of special education schools. Seventy per cent of the sum due each state goes to government institutions, while the rest is apportioned to private service providers like Akpodim Rehabilitation Centre.

I asked Owunzurike if he has ever received any intervention from the commission or the basic education board in the state. “School uniforms, shoes and bags, that is what we’ve gotten from them I know,” he replies.

He also tells me UBEC sited a fully equipped ICT centre on the property. The centre he refers to is an e-accessibility project built by the Universal Service Provision Fund under the aegis of the Nigerian Communication Commission. He also tells me the school is looking to revive its agricultural section in order to generate revenue.


Chiderah had part of her secondary school education in Orlu Girls Secondary School, Imo State. This is the only school for female pupils that has a resource teacher in the state. She was forced to graduate in Ebonyi State though. Her explanation was “The environme

http://saharareporters.com/2019/12/31/abandoned-fate-strife-filled-lives-visually-impaired-pupils-nigeria’s-south-east-part-2

If there is one place in Nigeria where education, or schooling is taken seriously, it's the south east. The south east easily boasts of the best all round students in the country. The quality of schools in the south east is second to none. Not only are government schools functional and efficient, private schools are outdoing public schools

Igbos has been so consistent in their domination of every education indices in the country that it's not in doubt of whom the first 3 best results in UTME or WAEC best student will be. That is an eloquent testimony on the efficacy of schools in the south east.

Almost all schools I know in the south east have been renovated twice. That's how much we love our schools.

Forget the bad news, some people actually get high by sniffing bad news

SLAP44:
Continue lying

The article was by an Ibo man

The Problems of south-easterners are created by their leaders who are so gullible to differentiate what's good from bad.E.g they sold their destinies in Abia for just four litres of kerosene per head,now they have themselves to be blamed

Public schools is like hell fire all over Nigeria except some places in Lagos with alumni


Perhaps Ibadan boys high school with Kudasi, I believe Seyi makide as alumni etc is also in a good shape

The OP's father was an inmate in that school.

This is another reason Biafra should come.

The state government should take over the school immediately.

Osaze007:



The article was by an Ibo man

In the end it's you that brought it to nairaland to wail. Wail on.

Rem22:
The Problems of south-easterners are created by their leaders who are so gullible to differentiate what's good from bad.E.g they sold their destinies in Abia for just four litres of kerosene per head,now they have themselves to be blamed

Ikpeazu gave you kerosine, they gave you ijebu garri and groundnut in Lagos. Then the fufu they gave you in osun, is it not kerosine you would need to power your stove?

One man has single handedly placed a cursed of mass hypnotism on you all.

Your heads were cracked open and your brains eaten for breakfast in ikoyi.

Rem22:
The Problems of south-easterners are created by their leaders who are so gullible to differentiate what's good from bad.E.g they sold their destinies in Abia for just four litres of kerosene per head,now they have themselves to be blamed

Yup Infact the Anambra First Lady is busy in USA sharing to homeless while poverty ravages south east

Gandollaar:
Ikpeazu gave you kerosine, they gave you ijebu garri and groundnut in Lagos. Then the fufu they gave you in osun, is it not kerosine you would need to power your stove?

One man has single handedly placed a cursed of mass hypnotism on you all.

Your heads were cracked open and your brains eaten for breakfast in ikoyi.

Kerosene in abia
Cow meat in Anambra
Dirty water in Enugu Na only una

Osaze007:


Kerosene in abia
Cow meat in Anambra
Dirty water in Enugu Na only una

C'mon shattap! Your sisters are prostituting in Europe while the mothers at home are all witches and people still wonder why you are so unfortunate.

Gandollaar:
C'mon shattap! Your sisters are prostituting in Europe while the mothers at home are all witches and people still wonder why you are so unfortunate.

Osaze007:



Yup Infact the Anambra First Lady is busy in USA sharing to homeless while poverty ravages south east

While the first lady in Zamfara is hiding under her bed. Different strokes.

SLAP44:

Edo Dey learn where Igbo Dey for ashewo work
Even your men are homosexuals
The typical Igbo man is a bisexual

[s]

Osaze007:
As Igbo land burns Igbos are busy focusing on Yoruba land and their schools are dilapidated


Abia School for the Blind serves both Abia and Imo states. It haswell over a 100 pupils in residence as at the time of my visit.


“Ermm… we teach them Mathematics But the math equipment we don’t have enough. We are supposed to be using tailor frames and tiles,” the school official I spoke with responded after I asked if the students are taught Mathematics.

I asked how the students and teachers are able to work together then and the official casually says they manage what they have. Unfortunately, the shortage is hampering effective learning.

“They use their brain oh,” the official tells me, answering my query as to how the students write math exams.

Keeping with the tradition of schools in Enugu, teachers here read to the students during exams. Theschool owns at least two embossers but the principal says there are no operators to make them function. When I broached the subject of government’s help in getting more learning materials, a cough echoes.

“No government here oh,” the official says in a small voice. “Government here don’t pay. It is individuals and churches that give us the little support we have to feed the children, to take care of them.”

I checked my mental notes and asked if this was a state owned institution, a chorus of chuckles pre-empts the response.

“I have not received my February salary of this year, I received only January, likewise some of the teachers here who belong to School Basic Management Committee.In this school, all fingers are not equal. Staff from the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board, had not been paid since April, while those employed by the state ministry of education have it rosy.”

The official has been in the school for three years and says the government has only provided subvention once.

“Since 2016 that I resumed work here, it is only last year November that they gave us subvention,” they said.

The School for the Blind, Umuahia, has a remedial programme as well. The officials tell me theirs is a two-year course. Most of the male students have proceeded to Government College Umuahia for their secondary school education. It is the Alma mater of my guide in Abia State, Wisdom Kalu, who is the chairman of the Nigerian Association of the Blind in the State.

Constructed in the 1920s, the school still has wooden flooring. Its old boys have reached a deal with the Abia State government to take over the school and are slowly draining out all students admitted by the government.

It has two sets left and there is only one blind pupil in the schoolwhen we arrived. Our interaction is, however, with the school’s low-voiced resource teacher. There is no variation to the nature of learning for the 20 students she had upon assumption of her current position. The students had no care for maths, they studied without textbooks,they have their question papers read to them during internal exams, seek the aid of their resource teacher for external ones – where braille is provided and had almost no taste of ICT training.

Kalu, however, informs the teacher that NAB attracted the donation of a few computers to the school. He requests to know if the PCs, which are to be used for the ICT update of the students is in safe storage.

“I am not aware of it,” she replies.


Pay more, get less

At Holy Ghost College, a Catholic mission school in Umuahia, I met Tochi, one of two blind students in the school. Tochi’s parents remit N46,000 per term to procure quality education for their child from the institution.

Even though their son is one of the few children paying fees to obtain an education in the three states of the South-East I visited, his training is no different from what those who attend classes free receive. So, what does Tochi do during math class since he cannot escape to the Resource Room like I did in secondary school?

“I just relax and listen to what they are saying,”

The school has almost no consideration for this pupil. He is forced to abandon the use of his typewriter in class, because he does not type as fast as the sighted write with their pen.

“If I make use of typewriter, they will tell me I’m delaying them. By the time I meet up, their own has finished. I don’t have much time to write. That is why somebody will tell me the question, I will answer, then he or she will jot it down.”

The youngster is not bothered about the quality of education he is receiving – he knows no better. His pain, however, is with the feeling of alienation he gets in class, especially during impromptu tests.

“Sometimes, I feel so bad. If they are taking test, I will be looking at them. I do not get to write many tests.”

Before Tochi arrived at the principal’s office where I was waiting, a staff had prepared my mind to expect the neglect. After a rambling lecture on how special students should be educated, the official informedme that his institution does not have any of those in place


Rejection – the easy way out

The state government-owned William Memorial has had no blind student in school in a long while. The school officials had maintained the status quo.

“Before I came, those that were here had already graduated. One or two persons came, I told them that we don’t have the facilities here— that whoever wants to keep you here is just trying to deceive you. In a winding conversation, the official tells me the Abia State government ought to create a secondary school for the blind.

“Here, because they are in the normal school, during exams students write for them. I am a Christian, I cannot condone that kind of exam malpractice. If they want this school to take blind students, they should equip this school.”

The school refused admission to five students. Kalu confirmed to me in a phone call after I had left that he traced four of the five students to schools in Imo and Anambra.

Leaving the presence of the frustrated but passionate official at William Memorial, I met with Reverend Jane Samuel, the principal of Holy Rosary Secondary School.

She is frustrated with the services rendered by the state government to the blind pupils in her school. The thought of turning them back has not occurred yet. Telling me why her students are not numerically literate she says, “They tell us what they can do and what they cannot. Even in WAEC they don’t offerMaths. That is why we call them ‘special students.’ They know their capacity.”

Her explanation not sufficient for me, I tell her it is the school who should expand the minds of the students.

“If I have a special teacher, I will know a lot about them,”she rebuts. “During the takeover of schools by the church, I visited the ministry several times to give me a special teacher and they couldn’t give me. In that case, there was nothing we could do.” We are thinking of asking the government not to post them here since we don’t give them much services.”

Her students – five girls, receive free tuition but have to pay boarding fees. Two are fee-paying students, while the other three are sponsored by the state government. She says she has not received any payment for students who come to the institution through the government since Governor Okezie Ikpeazu assumed office.

“The government is playing pranks on us,” she complains. “We want to go and tell them, ‘Look, it is better you come and take your students,” she says.


What has government done?

Under UBEG grants, Abia has been allotted N12.66bn worth of funding since 2005. As at July 22 2019, the state had received N9.67bn, leaving N2.99bn unclaimed because of default in its counterpart contribution.

For persons dependent on UBEC funding for special education in the state, N253.13m is what they should receive if the state makes a full claim on all funds available to it, N193.36m is what these school centres should have received through the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board for various projects and N59.78m is what they will be unable to access till the state government provides the matching grant to UBEC.

The official at School for the Blind, Umuahia says she has not received a coin from UBEC or its state equivalent. While I was unable to reach Okechukwu Ananaba,the chairman of the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board, I got through to the head education services in the Abia State ministry of education, Victoria Adindu, who chose not to comment or facilitate a response.

The details of the Abia State 2019 budget is not as spelt out as that of Enugu State. The School for the Blind, Umuahia, is not listed anywhere on the budget document I found. Under the Ministry of Special Duties is a heading called vulnerable groups. This heading received a budgetary allocation of N71.08m. It is unclear, however, if this is where funds that should go to School for the Blind, Umuahia, comes from.


A curse to be blind in Imo State

Of all the states I visited, Imo, it appears, is the worst place to be struck with blindness. When Abia and Imo states were one, a school that catered to the learning needs of blind and deaf students existed in Orlu.


The creation of Abia State, saw blind students migrate to Umuahia – the capital of Abia while the school in Orlu now attends to the deaf alone. The only route to rehabilitation in the state is the Anglican Church-run vocational centre in Akpodim, Mbaise local government, where blind persons are valued enough to learn how to make brooms and old-fashioned baskets.

Trainees, some of whom have been there for nine years, say they are counting meals. Chiderah is the youngest student I spoke with.She has been at the centre since she left school in 2017. In that time, no one has taught her how to make brooms, baskets or manipulate cane into different furniture.

“My brother, I don’t see anything I’m learning here. Since I got here, I’ve been hearing that they are learning how to make beads, brooms, chairs and other things but I’ve not seen anyone to teach us.”

The centre said it teaches its trainees braille reading and writing as well as typewriting. Uche has made the centre his home for nine years now. In that length of time, he said he has seen typewriter instructors just once.

“We have some machines here. Some typewriter machines. But there’s nobody to teach us how to use it. Since nine years I have been here, only once they come. They stay like four weeks before they go.”

Another trainee I spoke to, addressed by everyone in the centre as ID, said whatever training offered in the centre is archaic and of little monetary value. He gave truth to young Chiderah’s information, saying “Well, I can say that we are abandoned. As you see, they came to our hostel to get us, you would not have had to send somebody to call us, because we are there in our shop.”

Mr. Angus Owunzurike has been the secretary of a committee set-up to look after the centre for three years. I told him of Chiderah’s two wasted years and Uche’s nine years in the centre, with just four weeks of typewriting training. He says the school has been without instructors for a long time. According to him, the last resident instructors furthered their education and took up better job offerings. He says the centre has so far been unable to attract instructors to its rural-location.

“We are still using those we’ve trained there to train the other ones,” he says. Stating how dire affairs at the centre are he says, “If we can get the instructors from anywhere to teach.” There is one glitch however. “We have to hire them with money and we don’t have much. “

UBEC reserves two per cent of the basic education funds for each state of the federation for the needs of special education schools. Seventy per cent of the sum due each state goes to government institutions, while the rest is apportioned to private service providers like Akpodim Rehabilitation Centre.

I asked Owunzurike if he has ever received any intervention from the commission or the basic education board in the state. “School uniforms, shoes and bags, that is what we’ve gotten from them I know,” he replies.

He also tells me UBEC sited a fully equipped ICT centre on the property. The centre he refers to is an e-accessibility project built by the Universal Service Provision Fund under the aegis of the Nigerian Communication Commission. He also tells me the school is looking to revive its agricultural section in order to generate revenue.


Chiderah had part of her secondary school education in Orlu Girls Secondary School, Imo State. This is the only school for female pupils that has a resource teacher in the state. She was forced to graduate in Ebonyi State though. Her explanation was “The environme

http://saharareporters.com/2019/12/31/abandoned-fate-strife-filled-lives-visually-impaired-pupils-nigeria’s-south-east-part-2

[/s]

Osaze007:


Edo Dey learn where Igbo Dey for ashewo work
Even your men are homosexuals
The typical Igbo man is a bisexual

Bobrisky and Denrele Edun thinks otherwise

SLAP44:


Bobrisky and Denrele Edun thinks otherwise

Ebuka
Uti chuku
Flavour
Alex ekubo
Dey learn work

SLAP44:

Abi nau

Mad obsession fueled by a deep inferiority complex will soon drive somebody to the market, the madness is encroaching fast. If you know this chap please help him before it is too late.
How many threads? all very hateful and senseless.

Osaze007,

If not for self help of students, education in the east would grind to near zero.
You mentioned School for the Deaf and Girls Secondary School, both in Orlu.Today, no road leads to the two schools, as Imo governors are one after the other building state capital where they and the well to do settle down with their families.

Osaze, you no go rest?
This new year, cant you see Nigeria isn't making headway?
Is this what your 2020 will be all about?
Worse part of it is that all these stuffs you say are all lies.
Guy, get creative for yourself or even for mankind this 2020