Lagos orders relocation of 64 private schools

No fewer than 64 private primary and secondary schools in Lagos State have been ordered by the state government to relocate because of their alleged non-conduciveness for human and educational activities.

The Director-General of the Office of Education Quality Assurance in the State’s Ministry of Education, Mrs. Ronke Soyombo, made the disclosure at the annual school managers’ workshop organised by the League of Muslim School Proprietors, LEAMSP, in Ikeja, recently. About 230 members of LEAMSP participated in the forum.

Soyombo said the affected schools, spread across the state, were operating in either swampy or flooding areas or very dirty and poorly ventilated structures as well as, in places totally unsafe for human beings.

“We discovered that owners of those schools only interested in money making and not about quality service and not about safety of their children. So, the state can no longer tolerate them to continue operating because doing so would do no good but harm particularly to students, who are our future,” she explained.

Speaking on “Safeguarding the right of a child,” Soyombo however disclosed that while some of the schools involved had already complied with the directive or pleaded for more time, some rather dragged the government to court asking for reversal of the order.

The action of those in the latter category, she said, would not deter government from making our educational institutions both public and private, doing what is right.

However, she urged the private school owners including LEAMSP’s members to take safety and total education of their students most important (and not money) in their operations.

Also speaking, Mrs. Taiwo Elemoma, who is the Chief Education Officer, Guidance and Counselling Department, State Universal Basic Education Board, SUBEB, asked participants to institute at a matter of must, functioning and effective guidance and counselling unit in their schools, saying the students would need to be properly guided in career choice and other matters that would help them to succeed in life.

The Chairman of LEAMSP, Lagos chapter, Mr. Fatai Raheem in his address of welcome, said his association does organise the workshop for members yearly to educate (and remind) them of important issues that would make them to operate according to global best practices.

“And this kind of forum has really been an eye opener to many of us in the ideal way to run our schools,” he said.