The Osun government says it has shut more than 600 nursery and primary schools operating without minimum standard requirements in the state.
The Commissioner for Education, Folorunsho Bamisayemi, said this during an inter-ministerial news conference organised by the Ministry of Information and Civic Orientation on Wednesday in Osogbo.
Mr Bamisayemi said the closure of the schools was part of the state government’s effort to sanitise the sector.
“We have declared a war on mushroom schools,” he said. “We have zero tolerance for quacks in the system and schools that do not meet the required standard.”
“We know the danger of mushroom schools, because once the education foundation of a child is destroyed, it becomes difficult to build a solid structure on it.”
Mr Bamisayemi said that it was now compulsory for anyone that wanted to establish a school to have a Teacher’s Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) Certificate, among other requirements.
Also speaking, Olalekan Badmus, the Commissioner for Regional Integration and Special Duties, said ”the government was feeding more than 30,000 vulnerable persons on a monthly basis under its food support scheme”.
Mr Badmus said the state government was spending more than N100 million on the food support scheme every month.
“The vulnerable in the society are also a major concern for the governor, and that was how the issue of Osun Food Support Scheme came to be, with 30,000 people benefitting from the scheme monthly.
“We have successfully implemented the scheme over three months, and we have done rice component and semovita.
“We are also looking at the possibility of having a ‘combo’ package that will break the monotony of one food component.
“We have ensured the credibility of the scheme through reliance on the World Bank verified social register to identify the vulnerable.
“We have also ensured feedback mechanism to monitor the effectiveness of this scheme,” Mr Badmus said.