Efio-Ita Nyok|17 March 2018
As part of the 80th Anniversary Celebration and Inter-House Sport Competition of the prestigious West African Peoples' Institute (WAPI), Calabar the lawmaker representing the people of Calabar Municipality and Odukpani in the Federal House of Representatives (HoR), Rt. Hon. Eta Mbora has attracted a 50 seat/computer kitted Hybrid Library as well as the donation of a building block to the secondary school NegroidHaven can confirm. Mbora had his name tagged to a hall in the school premises.
Mbora explained to newsmen that his motivation for attracting the 50 computers, seats and building block to WAPI is borne out of the fact it's his Alma Mater besides being a member of the HoR committee on local content and the need to address facilities for writing the prerequisite JAMB examination for admission into Nigerian tertiary academic institutions.
According to him, 'First, the background is that it's my Alma Mater. I finished here by 1981 from Form One to Form Five. It used to be Form One to Form Five as against Class now.
'Concerning the hybrid library that has been commissioned today, I am a member of the House of Representatives Committee on Local Content like I said earlier on. And when we were harassing some corporate entities doing business in Nigeria about their social investment priorities in respect of secondary and tertiary educational facilities which were to be considered, I chose WAPI and CRUTECH. This one has come to fruition.
'Again, we also thought that in trying to get our children to write JAMB in UNICAL, etc they send some of them out, I then thought we also needed a Knowledge and JAMB Centre, thus I nominated this school again for a 50 seat Knowledge and JAMB Centre which is going to be provided with full Internet access and back up plans to run it'.
When queried about whether the project he had attracted where not inspired by the characteristic need to improve his voting chances during the forthcoming general election in 2019, the lawmaker denied saying that the procurement process in the country which is unusually long in respect of time was the reason for the delay.
He said that, 'their procurement process is slow. Like we all know that debate on the budget is going on. Even the role-over programme we are doing on the budget is being delayed because of our procurement process, which is bad : It takes over 6 months to do that, so the process is to be blamed.
'We would have come earlier than now if we had an effective and fast procurement process. But, we are also following up on the project we have had the privilege to select and nominate'.
Mbora called for the privatisation of public schools, both post primary and post secondary for the reason that the management of these public educational facilities are largely not prudent in managing of public resources at their disposal. His words, 'I think the ones driven by the private sector do better, because they know that they put money in there, so they get committed and do what they are supposed to do. The public sector in Nigeria has a lot of problems. For me I have been one of the pushers of saying that let schools and universities be independent and autonomous and fend for themselves. Because they get fees. The same way I send myself to private school, is the same way things should run in a public facility : but, they are not actually prudent', he concluded.
Present at the occasion of the commissioning of the hybrid library was the Executive Governor of Cross River State, His Excellency Sen. Prof. Ben Ayade represented by the Honourable Commissioner for Education Mr Goddy Eta, the Honourable Member representing Calabar Municipality at the 8th House of Assembly, the Chief of Staff to the State Governor, Mr Martin Orim, and former prominent old-students, school management, teachers, students and the general public.
Efio-Ita Nyok
Is the Blogger-in-Chief, Editor-in-Chief & Publisher of NegroidHaven