Ondo State Governor, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, SAN, on Thursday, hosted Secondary School Principals across the country at the International Cultural and Event Centre (The Dome) for the 2018 All Nigeria Confederation of Principals of Secondary Schools (ANCOPSS NATIONAL) annual National Congress.
Arakunrin Akeredolu described as appropriate, the theme of the ANCOPSS 2018 annual national congress, tagged Managing Insecurity in Public Schools: A Teacher – Student Approach.
The governor, who lamented the insecurity situation in public secondary schools in the country, stressed the need to put all hands on deck to nip the ugly development in the bud.
Reliving the experience in rescuing the Kidnapped Ugbonla Model School boys, Akeredolu said “We made a case of what the government can do when the students were Kidnapped. The Lagos state government approached us and asked what we can do to help in Ondo state because we share the creek together.
“We share the same problem and they felt we could assist. We went into the place, and having identified where the students are, we were able to discuss and negotiate, we didn’t pay, we got them back and took them to Lagos safely.
“We discussed with those who were responsible and they said they were left out in the amnesty program. We spoke with the Federal government on disarming them, today, they have laid down arms and ammunitions and the Federal government has assured us that they will be incorporated soon.”
Arakunrin Akeredolu also disclosed that his administration has kept to the promise of not owning salaries of teachers and other workers in the state since its assumption of office.
Accoding to him, When we came in, teachers are being owed salaries. Since we came, we have been paying regularly. We have not owned a single month. And because we believe government is continuum, we have settled some of the arrears we met. We have also promoted teachers.
But, a number of our Schools do not have enough teachers. Through SUBEB, we want to make sure that our schools have enough teachers but paucity of fund is really hindering us to recruit enough teacher in our Schools. If we do not do this, it is a failing on the part of the government. We are also looking at training and retraining of teachers
“A number of our secondary schools are dilapidated but if you go around today, you will see we are making concerted efforts to rehabilitate them. We do not intend to build any mega school. We are fencing up our schools and putting all necessary security measures in place,” he Concluded.
