Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State has expressed the plans of his administration to replicate the construction of the Federal Government’s SMART School Initiative in each of the three senatorial districts of the state.
Makinde, who stated this while receiving a delegation of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) in his office, said that his government was set to enhance the quality of teaching, learning and the use of Information Communication Technology (ICT).
The team was led to the Governor’s Office by the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, Arch. Sonny Echono.
The Governor commended UBEC for its support efforts in uplifting basic education and Better Education Service Delivery for All (BESDA) initiative as well as plans to eliminate out-of-school syndrome in the State.
He said, “I want to welcome this delegation to Oyo State and will like to thank you for your support to our state at the basic education level and even at the BESDA level. Ibadan, actually, used to be ahead of the education capital of not just Nigeria but the whole continent; but we lost all of that along the line. “Suddenly, we had the most out-of-school children in the entire South West and that was the situation we were in when we came in”.
“When we came in, I met Dr. Bobboyi in Abuja and when I saw the design of those smart schools, I assured that we are going to replicate it in Oyo State and said we will have, in each of our Senatorial District, such school for our gifted and talented children. It is a work in progress and we will get there. When I was going round during the electioneering, the people told me not to tell them about what the previous administration did not do but what exactly I wanted to do for them. So, we developed the Roadmap for Accelerated Development of Oyo State and we put it on four major pillars and Education is one of them”, he added.
The governor equally explained that as part of the fulfilment of the promise made to UBEC, his administration has not only met the recommendation of UNESCO for education but surpassed it in the 2021 budget.
According to him, “One of the things that I can remember I promised the UBEC team in the early days of this administration is that we will meet the UNESCO recommendation in terms of the percentage of our budget to the education, and I am happy to report that, for 2021 budget, we have not only met the recommendation but have actually surpassed it. I also want to use this opportunity to specially thank the Oyo UBEC Coordinator. Each time we have gone out to commission UBEC/SUBEB projects, she is always there with us. She has been of tremendous to support to Oyo SUBEB”.
While speaking on BESDA in Oyo State, Governor Makinde, promised that his administration would align with UBEC on BESDA fund.
“Finally, this is for us an example of how the state, the sub-national government can collaborate with the FG to ensure the programmes and policies actually get the desired results at the local level. We will ensure that we do that effectively and this is an opportunity to demonstrate that.”
