The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Edo State has condemned the state government’s decision to indefinitely postpone the resumption date for schools due to the recent fuel price hike, calling it “expensive political gimmickry.”
The Permanent Secretary in the State Ministry of Education, Ojo Akin-Longe, announced the postponement of the previously scheduled September 9 resumption date until further notice.
In response, the APC’s Publicity Secretary, Mr. Peter Uwadiae-Enosorogbe, criticized the state government’s move as politically motivated and surprising.
He expressed concern that the government’s actions were jeopardizing the educational progress of children for political reasons.
“You cannot sacrifice the education pursuit of the children for fuel scarcity. It is not today we are having a hike in fuel prices. This cannot derail the educational system.
“Nobody is protesting the hike and no parents have complained that they cannot take their children to school for learning. This is not adding up.
“To every reasonable and rational individual, the government has erred again. It is one of the mistakes of the state government.
“It is not in the interest of the children; it is not in the interest of the parents and it is not in the interest of the educational system,” he said.
Uwadiae-Enosorogbe called for the reversal of the decision, saying that state education had suffered a lot under this administration.
According to him, statistics of performance for the recently released results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination ranked Edo 26th as against first and second positions in the past.
“If you now postpone resumption, how are you going to mitigate the time you have made them stay at home deliberately? Meanwhile, the parents are not complaining,” the APC spokesperson said.
He called on the stakeholders to prevail on the government to open the schools, adding that it was illogical for the government to keep at home children whose parents had paid school fees and bought textbooks.
“The children are eager to go back to classes to learn. So the government should not use political gimmickry to checkmate them.
“Edo government should be talked to, because the action is an aberration; the action is uncalled for; the action is not in the interest of anybody,” he said.
(NAN)