Kwara PDP, APC trade words over out-of-school children. 

Kwara PDP, APC trade words over out-of-school children. 

Olaitan Ogundele

The People Democratic Congress (PDP) and the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) in Kwara State are engaged in exchanging words concerning the predicament of students who are out of school in the state. 

The Publicity Secretary of Kwara PDP, Olusegun Adewara, stated yesterday that the number of out-of-school children in the state was 84,247 in 2018, when his party was in power. 

“The situation surged to 141,325 in 2022, an increase of 68 per cent, in just three years of Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq,” he added. 

Positing that the claim of Kwara improving school enrolment by 48.7 per cent at the basic level and reducing learning deprivation in public schools from 70.8 percent to 51.6 percent between 2019 and 2023 is not just an attempt to twist reality but deceitful. 

He challenged the state government to furnish the citizens with sources of their data or apologise for misleading the populace. 

“Despite the over N14 billion the Abdulrahman government claimed to have expended on basic education since 2019, which was accessed from Universal Basic education Commission (UBEC), government schools in Kwara are still in pitiable state, with many not even suitable for pigs’ pen.” 

His APC counterpart, Tajudeen Folaranmi, reasoned that the out-of-school phenomenon, which is a function of many variables such as migration patterns, cultural beliefs, and poor attitude of some guardians from Kwara and other states, is being tackled through various strategies.

“Such strategies include public enlightenment and a carrot-and-stick approach in communities where children of school age are compelled to go to farm during school hours.

 Since 2018, out-of-school children’s data represented the realities of the previous year (2017). It is expected that PDP would show the data for 2019 or even 2020 to properly situate its full realities,” he stated.