PHOTO: Front view of the school bulding
Benjamin Oshokoya, six, is a young boy
bubbling with life. Now in Basic Two in one of the best schools around
the Shangisha area of Lagos, his dream of becoming an accountant in the
near future is gradually taking shape. Privileged to be born into a
financially stable family, he is enjoying the best type of education
money can buy. His life outside the school setting is also an
interesting bit. With a vast array of luxury at his disposal and a
massive prospect ahead, little Ben cannot ask for more.
But fast forward 240 kilometers away in
Opoo, a remote community at the outskirts of Okaka in Itesiwaju Local
Government Area of Oyo State, life is a different mix for Abiola Bankole
and her two little siblings – Yemi and Ibukun. Unlike Benjamin’s posh
school with all the modern facilities to aid learning, their school,
Community Primary School Opoo, boasts only three classrooms with no
basic facilities to support any meaningful academic exercise. Two out of
the three classrooms have their roof completely blown off by the wind
while the only surviving one shared by the entire school of about 150
pupils is half way from finally caving. More than half of the schools
population wear mufti to classes because their parents cannot afford
uniforms. Many of the children carry their books to school in sacks or
with their bare hands. Not only that, pupils drink water mixed with
cattle urine and faeces as the only source of water in community is
shared by both animals and human begins. For the three siblings and
dozens of their little colleagues in this tiny agrarian community, there
is nothing to dream about in the future. The harsh environment they
live in and the terrible condition under which they learn at this
dilapidated school building rob them of the frills that come along with
formative years.
“I want to be a doctor,” seven-year-old
Abiola said to our correspondent in an emotional show of ambition. Yemi,
her five-year-old sibling, who could not hide his excitement at seeing a
new face in the community on this day, wants to be a teacher on his
part. But sadly, all those lofty dreams might never go beyond this tiny
settlement – they might evaporate into thin air before many of these
children make the seven-kilometre trip that separates Opoo and the
nearest town – Alaga or even farther at Okaka where things are a bit
fairer.
“We have encountered a lot of problems in
this place especially on the bad condition of the school,” Ojelabi
David Abioye, headmaster of the school, explained to our correspondent.
“We have taken a lot of pictures to the local government and written
several letters yet nothing has been done about this. They have promised
us several times to do something about the situation but it is still
the same.
“Last week, we were also at the local
government office to complain to them because there is almost nowhere
left for the pupils to learn. The only classroom the entire school is
managing at the moment is gradually being taken over by termites and
other dangerous animals that are destroying the entire building and the
little furniture in it. Whenever there is heavy wind and storm, we can’t
stay in the classroom because the remaining roof might collapse on us,”
he said.
Abioye, who became head-teacher of the school about 17 years ago, told Saturday PUNCH
that the present situation is making learning almost impossible for the
children of Opoo and surrounding settlements who are serviced only by
the school. Giving an insight into how bad things really are, Abioye
revealed that himself and one other teacher, Julius Solola, are the only
ones teaching the entire school of around 150 pupils because government
has refused to post in more hands to assist them. The workload, he
says, is neck-breaking.
“Government has not employed teachers for
a long time and that is why the situation is very bad at the moment.
The other teacher (Solola) joined me here nine years ago and we have
been doing the job of about 10 people alone. We used to be three here
but one person was transferred to another school outside this locality.
“Personally, I have lodged several
complaints at the local government office but all they tell me is that
the government has not taken a stand on our case, that until that is
done, nothing will happen.
“This is really affecting the pupils
because the environment is not conducive for any form of learning. In
fact, most times we have to bring out benches and desks for some pupils
to be taught under a tree outside the school building while the others
manage to learn in the only classroom. There is no library or any modern
equipment with which to teach the pupils.
“Once it starts raining, we ask all the
children to go home because the roof is very bad. For that day, that
will be the end of studies,” he said.
The size of each of the classroom is only
a few yards larger than the space inside most commercial buses in Lagos
and other major Nigerian cities, our correspondent observed during the
visit. Pupils squeeze themselves into less than 15 desks in the only
surviving classroom while several others watch the teacher from the
corridor, leaving a sizable number to sit on the bare floor under the
orange tree outside the school building, waiting for their turns to be
taught in the classroom.
While teaching was going on, two pupils
from Basic One engaged in a scuffle, attracting the attention of the
headmaster who whipped them lightly for distracting the rest of the
class. Shortly, pupils from Basic One and Two who had been sharing the
only one class at the same time were asked to move out for their seniors
in Basic Five to come in for their turn. On other days, the three
categories are taught at the same time crammed into different rows
inside the same classroom. The commotion of having at least 100 pupils
in this tiny room at the same time on such days can best be imagined.
Screaming, crying and distraction of all forms are always the situation.
The pupils can hardly concentrate in a classroom whose temperature is
far below normal, leaving many of them drenched in sweat while the two
teachers attend to them the best way they can.
Following the jam-packed nature of the
class when our correspondent visited, many of the pupils looked worn
out and very stressed by the time they came out of the classroom. The
situation is not peculiar to this particular day; it is a familiar
scenario which now threatens the academic and wellbeing of the young
pupils.
Apart from this very troubling situation,
the menace of rampaging Fulani nomads is also now a threat to the
education of many children in this locality. Many parents, for fear of
the safety of their children, are very reluctant to allow them walk the
long distance to school. Like the headmaster, Solola says this has
greatly affected the activities of the school.
“Fulani nomads are disturbing residents
of this community. They are destroying people’s farmlands and as a
result, a lot of families have moved out of this area with their
children to places where they feel safe. I have once been attacked while
coming to school along the highway and they collected everything I had
on me. Many parents are withdrawing their children as a result and the
school now has only pupils in Basic One, Two and Five. The ones in Basic
Three and Four have stopped coming for now.
“During lessons, the pupils all share the
same class. The Basic One pupils sit on a row, Basic Two on another
while the pupils of Basic Five also sit on the last row.
“We use the black board to teach Basic
One first; then we switch over to Two while the others sit quietly and
watch before we finally face Basic Five. This is the way we teach them.
“The headmaster has been working
tirelessly to ensure the authorities look into our case but no luck yet.
I come all the way from Okaka, about nine kilometers away to this place
every day to teach the pupils. It has been very strenuous,” Solola
said.
Chilling as it sounds, the terrible state
of the community’s only school and the threat posed by Fulani nomads
are only a fraction of the challenges people of Opoo and surrounding
communities contend with on daily basis. The once vibrant and
well-stocked health centre established only in 2007 now lays prostrate.
Overgrown by weeds and taken over by insects and dangerous reptiles, it
is a pale shadow of its former self. Expectant mothers on the verge of
delivery are either rushed to hospital on motorcycle, if it’s available,
or escorted on foot to the nearest town seven kilometers away. Some
mothers have not been able to survive this tough test, community leaders
said . The babies had come too quickly along the bumpy and narrow road
leading into the settlement just before their mothers got to the nearest
hospital or received any medical help.
It is a similar experience for sick
indigenes of the area that have mostly relied on local herbal
concoctions or had to make the long trip outside Opoo to get medical
help.
“One of our pregnant women almost died
recently while we were taking her to the hospital in the next town,”
Orimatanmi Aderounmu, head of Opoo community told our correspondent. “It
was late in the evening and we could not get a motorcycle on time to
rush her down, so she delivered along the road. Thank God one of our
women had little experience in this aspect; she was the one who assisted
in the delivery of the child before a nurse came in the following day
to look at her and the child.
“We are really suffering. The lack of a
functional health centre or hospital is really affecting us. Whatever
happens to us here, we have to go all the way to Okaka to get medical
attention.
“Personally I have been to the local
government office several times to let them know what we are passing
through but nobody seems concerned with our situation. I let them know
that we are too many in this settlement not to have a good health
facility with drugs and doctors to attend to our medical needs. But
nobody is ready to listen to our cries.
“The health centre we have here has been
closed down since last October. Before that time, the doctor and other
medical staff used to be on ground on regular basis and the hospital was
regularly supplied with drugs. But since that time, we have been left
to suffer,” he said.
Chronic typhoid fever, constant stomach
upset and rheumatism are among the major sicknesses prevalent here. But
the lack of potable water in the entire community now leaves many
residents and especially children at the mercy of an even more dangerous
disease. They are at risk of cholera and an epidemic outbreak.
Opoo’s only water source is a shallow
hole that springs forth dirty water. It is shared by both humans and
cattle. The pupils wait for cattles to drink, urinate and pass out their
faces before they take same water to drink. When our correspondent
visited the site, Fulani women were seen washing dirty clothes directly
into the water source just moments before children from the settlement
arrived to fetch water. It is a practice that has gone on for a long
time but now puts many households in this locality in grave danger.
“If you see the water we drink, then you
will understand why there are so many sicknesses in this community,”
Aderounmu cuts in. “We are suffering from typhoid and many of the
children are always complaining of stomach pains.
“The Fulanis take their cattles to the
only source of water we are managing to drink here. In the process, the
cattles urinate and defecate inside the water. But because we don’t have
a choice, we wait for them to finish before fetching water from the
place. The water is not good at all but since government has refused to
help us, we have to keep managing it like that.”
Evangelist David Taiwo together with
fellow missionaries has taken it upon themselves to improve the living
condition of the largely impoverished residents of this Oyo settlement.
Like the early Western missionaries, Taiwo and his group are bringing
intervention projects along with the gospel of Christ. They are
constructing a well to ease the sufferings of the people and the health
risk they now face. However, lack of funds means the project has now
been stalled for several weeks.
“We have spent about N35, 000 so far to
dig the well but if we had cash, we would have finished it. We need ten
rings to set inside the well but we have bought only three. The person
digging it for us collected N15, 000. What we need now is another six
rings and workmanship for the person who would do the job. If we have
about N50, 000, it will take care of the rest of the well project. If we
can achieve this, it will go a long way in alleviating the sufferings
of the people,” Taiwo said.
Fifty thousand is a quarter of the amount
some Nigerians paid to watch a popular comedy show in Lagos recently.
But in Opoo, N50, 000 would change a whole lot. It would provide the
entire community its cleanest form of water supply in history and save
many households from the risk of cholera and other deadly diseases.
Like many tiny agrarian communities
tucked away in remote parts of the country, Opoo and neighbouring
settlements are yet to taste electricity supply. The people rely on a
few transistor radios for latest information in the country. Mobile
phones are mostly out of reach as a result of drained batteries.
“Only one person has generator in this
place. It is only when he has petrol to put it on that we can charge our
phones, if not we give anybody going to Okaka to charge for us. This is
how we have been surviving over the years,” Aderounmu told our
correspondent.
The Chairman of Itesiwaju Local
Government under whose jurisdiction Opoo falls, Olarinre Adeniji, was
said not to be on seat when our correspondent visited the secretariat to
find out what the administration was doing to ease the pains of the
residents of the area. An official who refused to give his name because
he was not authorised to speak to the press, however, revealed that lack
of adequate funds was responsible for the present situation in the
place.
“Even if the chairman wants to do things
for the people in that village, where is the money? There are many
projects to execute with very little cash. So, the attention mostly is
given to the most important areas. I am not saying Opoo or its people
are not important, what I am saying is that the major towns are given
consideration first before you can talk of communities in the
hinterland. But I know that very soon, their case will be addressed,”
the official said.
Indeed, life in this tiny Oyo settlement
is a mix of pains, sufferings and neglect. It is a case of flagrant
deprivation in the face of crushing and widespread poverty.
Predominantly farmers with little or no education, many adults have
grown up the hard and tortuous way. The community’s only school
established in 1997 to connect their children to a world of limitless
opportunities which education offers is now a thin line away from total
collapse while the hospital in the centre of the town is a distant
contrast from what it used to be. Unless relevant authorities and
corporate organisations quickly rise to the occasion, little children
like Abiola and Yemi might watch their dreams fizzle into thin air while
sick residents could be swallowed by an impending epidemic hovering
upon Opoo.
PUNCH Nigeria
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