Gov. Atiku Bagudu spends N19 billion to construct, renovate classrooms

Governor Atiku Bagudu’s government says it spent N19 billion to construct and renovate classrooms in Kebbi.

Specifically, Umaru Shehu-Adili, the head of the physical planning unit of the Kebbi State Universal Basic Education Board (KBSUBEB), disclosed on Thursday Mr Bagudu’s government used the money to construct and renovate 3,782 classrooms in the last seven years.

“His Excellency has so far injected not less than N19 billion as counterpart fund for UBE project matching ground. With this amount, we constructed and renovated no fewer than 3,782 classrooms for a conducive learning atmosphere in public schools across the state,” Mr Shehu-Adili said. “In this year’s intervention, we have a proposal of renovating 164 classrooms spread across the 21 LGEAs of the state.”

He stated this at the beginning of a two-day workshop and interactive session for SUBEB and technical officers from 21 local government education authorities (LGEAs).

The two-day event, organised by KBSUBEB, is on the implementation of the 2021 FGN-UBE matching grant projects. Mr Shehu-Adili lauded the efforts of the Kebbi government for prompt payment of counterpart funds for UBE programmes.

According to him, since the programme’s inception, Mr Bagudu remained the only governor paying counterpart fund for seven years consecutively.

“We intend to construct three blocks of classrooms, about 22 blocks of 44 classrooms, and each LGEA must have a minimum of a block of two classrooms, with the exception of Birnin Kebbi and Jega, who will have additional classrooms due to unavoidable pressing demand,” added the Kebbi official.

He added that renovation of blocks of classrooms in about eight Junior Secondary Schools would be carried out, in addition to drilling 6,000 litres of a motorised borehole in each of those schools, among others.

KBSUBEB chairman Suleiman Khalid noted with satisfaction that Kebbi State was ahead of all the 17 states currently running Better Education Service Delivery for All (BESDA) programme across Nigeria, according to reports.

Of the 3,782 renovated and constructed classrooms, Khalid said 1,314 new classrooms were constructed while 2,478 were renovated.

“Our renovation is so good that, once they are finished, people can hardly make a distinction between the renovated and newly constructed,” Mr Khalid said. 

(NAN)