World Bank-assisted schools’ projects rotting away in Lagos

Ambode

The intension was noble. Besides providing additional classrooms for students of the schools who sit in overcrowded classrooms, the structures were also meant to be modern facilities that make learning convenient and appealing. However, five years after the projects were scheduled for completion, they are all abandoned. The completion date was 2010. His is five years after.

By now, about five sets of students would already have passed through the facilities designed to accommodate 24-

Babatunde Fashola

classrooms and four staff rooms each. The schools’ projects are located in Onike Girls High School, Fazil Omar High School, St Francis Junior Grammar School and Igbobi Junior High School. An agency of Lagos State Government had the brief to execute the projects, with counterpart funding from the World Bank. The sad reality is that the projects have been abandoned and the facilities are already wasting away even though they are near completion. A recent visit to three of the schools showed that the contractors have since left the sites.

There is no doubt that the buildings would have served as palliatives to the acute shortage of learning facilities these schools glaringly lack, particularly adequate classrooms. The few available classrooms in these schools are shabby and uninhabitable.

At Onike Girls High School, Yaba, between 66 and 71 students sit one classroom. When it rains the students are forced to seek shelter elsewhere. This is because the old school buildings are falling apart, and have leaking roofs. On the other hand the teachers in the school use the old school hall as staff room.

It was also learnt that to make way for the new school structure, the building housing the school’s Home Economics Laboratory was demolished, with the hope that on completion the school would enjoy a better facility. But that remains in abeyance. Needless to say that the structure currently being used as Home Economics’ Laboratory is a much smaller place and certainly not convenient.

A teacher who spoke under anonymity in the school said it was a daunting experience teaching an overcrowded class. He stated that it has been quite hectic not only for the teachers but for the students, as many of them often strained themselves to hear teachers’ instructions in a class that is usually rowdy.

Although the new building is yet to be completed, its roof has been partly blowned away. In other words, poor execution and use of substandard materials is unquestionably the case. The doors and windowpanes are also partly damaged and rusting. It was learnt that when a section of the roof was blown off by rainstorm, it fell on someone and inflicted injuries on the person.

At St. Francis Junior Grammar School, Iwaya, although the school facilities are not over-stretched, but the completion of the building would have enabled the school admit more students in the new academic session just opened. However, the level of decay of the building project in this school seems to be the worse. While some of the doors and windowpanes have been blown off, others are cracked and in a state of disrepair. Also, some of the pillars in the classrooms are already caving in. This is besides a section of the roofing sheet that has been blown off. It was gathered that at night, the building is converted to all kinds of clandestine activities.

Students of Fazil Omar have started using the ground floor of the new building in their school. Shortage of classrooms is acute in this school, with the few available ones badly over-stretched. When the reporter visited, the school laboratories – Chemistry, Physic and Biology- also serve as classrooms. When the school had no place to accommodate its students it decided to clean up four of the classrooms on the ground floor of the uncompleted building for emergency classrooms. A makeshift chalkboard also completed the rehabilitation of the abandoned building. It was even gathered that one of the classes jointly occupied by commercial and arts students, has about 80 students taking each subject.

A staff of the school lamented that the school would likely face a bigger challenge when the new set of Senior Secondary School One resumes for the new academic session. Already over-crowded he wondering where the new students would be accommodated when they resume.

FINDING revealed that the construction of the modern school building in each of these schools was awarded by the Lagos State Government’s Lagos Metropolitan Development and Governance Project (LMDGP) to Contransimex Nigeria Limited. Although the construction started in 2009, with completion expected in July 2010, there were ground works as far back as 2007. For instance, at Fazil Omar High School a block of classroom was pulled down to accommodate the new modern building in 2008.

Though the contractor was not willing to make comment when contacted, it was gathered from an insider that the project was abandoned because the contract was terminated by the Lagos State Government while trying to reconcile accounts as jointly agreed upon by both parties. This was so because the state government had only made part payment, which was not enough to complete the project.

Speaking on the non-completion of the school buildings, Acting Executive Director of Human Development Initiative (HDI), Mrs. Olufunso Owasanoye, said that a teaching-learning environment that is conducive would significantly contribute to the attainment of educational objectives while lack or inadequate buildings and poor infrastructure remains the plight of most public schools, thereby having positive correlation with the decline in the quality of education.

Owasanoye noted that most classrooms in public schools in Lagos State are congested contrary to international best practices. She argued that an overcrowded classroom could disrupt free flow of interaction between teacher and students thereby diminishing the quality and quantity of teaching and learning that engenders poor outcomes.

She, therefore, pleaded with the state government not to abandon projects of this magnitude, especially at a point in time when access to quality education was being encouraged. She noted that completion of the modern school buildings was necessary, as it would go a long way in meeting the basic learning needs of the students.

On what the implication of the non-completion of the projects would have in getting funding from development partners in the future, Owasanoye stated that such partners would be face discouragement in future, saying development partner and others could easily point to projects like these that were not completed as reasons to back out.

“It will not encourage or motivate other partners to fund projects,” Owasanoye said. “But if they see that other projects that have been funded were executed and well done, they would be happy and probably want to do more. These projects need to be completed to restore the confidence of donors or development partners”.

Also commenting, Chairman of Parents Teachers Association (PTA), Lagos Mainland Local Government Council, Mr. Olusoji Adams stressed the importance of students learning under a conducive environment to ensure a better society. He therefore, called on Lagos State Government under Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to complete the projects in the four schools. According to him, efforts to get the state government in the past to intervene and complete the project did not yield fruit as the state government had been alerted about the non-completion of the buildings through a letter but there was no positive response.

He said anytime he had cause to visit any of the schools and see the condition in which the students were learning he usually did not feel happy. He wondered why the state government would allow the structures to be in a state of dilapidation. This, he said, was why the parents were passionately appealing to Ambode who they think is a lover of education and children to act fast and take action on the completion of the buildings.

Attempt to get Lagos State Government to comment on the reason for the cancellation of the contract for the projects and why they are abandonment of the was not successful. Public Relations Officer of the Ministry of Education, Mr. Jide Lawal failed to generate a needed response. When he eventually picked his telephone, he only promised to make enquiries on the matter. But it’s been over a month now and Lawal is yet to get reasonable response from his bosses on why the schools’ projects were abandoned or why the state government terminated the contract with Contransimex Nigeria Limited.