- Safiu Kehinde
Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara, has fired back at the Speaker of the state House of Assembly Speaker, Martin Amaewhule, who had earlier called him out over the poor state of public schools and inadequate number of teachers across the state.
NPO Reported that Amaewhule had in a video shared on X on Monday decried the deplorable state and dearth of teachers in the schools.
The Rivers Assembly Speaker disclosed how the House Committee Chairman on Education had discovered a school where a teacher was caught teaching both Primary One and Primary Two pupils in the same class.
Amaewhule accused Fubara of failing to employ new teachers after allegedly discarding the plan of his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, who intended to employ 10,000 new staff across the state,
He called for the utilisation of the N600 billion left by the administration of the immediate past Sole Administrator of the state, Vice Admiral Ibok-Ette Ibas.
Reacting to the allegation while addressing traditional rulers in Port Harcourt on Monday, Fubara maintained that education remain one of his administration’s priorities and promise to Rivers’ people.
The governor however held that the dearth of teachers across the state had been in existence long before his administration.
While blaming the six-month emergency rule in the state for hindering his plan, Fubara noted that he will employ based on needs and not with political undertone as he talked down the 10,000 jobs offer issued by Wike during his tenure,
“What is the next thing that we promised the people? Education. We are all aware of the deplorable state of our schools.
“They did not get to that stage in one month or three months or one year. It has been an issue. If you remember one of the things they used in abusing me when I was campaigning what are you people doing when are school system is very bad?
“There is no teacher in Eche. We all know this story. And if you want to be truthful to yourself, if at all we have had peace. I myself can say I have peace after we came back from emergency.
“Tell me, have there been any month before that very unfortunate incident that we had one week of rest?
“If we are talking about being focused, everybody will agree that even in the face of our crisis, we were focused. And if not what happened, we would have even exceeded the miles that we cut.
“I saw some set of people sending messages to my WhatsApp. They want to protest for 10,000 jobs they were employed, documented and they were even provided a budget.
“I will say it here and I’ve said it before. We are going to employ based on needs. Do we have teachers? No. Do we have doctors? They are insufficient.
“So, I’m not going to make employment politically because I want to please anybody. No! Employment will be based on the need of the state.” Fubara said,