Following the announcement that the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, will commence the Homegrown School Feeding Programme today, Thursday, May 14, 2020, in Abuja and subsequently, in Lagos and Ogun states, before the other states of the federation, in spite of the lockdown of schools to curtail the spread of coronavirus, an educationist, Chief Bolajoko Doherty (MFR), has joined other stakeholders to condemn the project as fraudulent and non-feasible.
Chief Doherty, the founder and proprietress of Bola Immaculate Group of Schools and President of Dynamic Women International Association, who had been in the business of school administration for over 35 years, said the insistence of the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq, to continue with the project is not only an embarrassment but fraudulent and impossible as the children that are meant to be the beneficiaries of the project are all in their parents’ homes.
Though the ministry claimed to have requested states to carry out mapping exercises in order to trace the households of the children using all available data sources including the School-Based Management Boards, community focal persons, cooks on the programme and most importantly existing school registers in the LGAs where the schools are domiciled, she said no principal can claim to know the houses of every pupil in his school.
“I kept quiet when the Minister for Humanitarian Affairs said she was giving food to schools before the lockdown; I made my enquiries in the South-West and I didn’t see any school, not even one school or one parent that confirmed that their children were given food. But this time around when I heard that she said they will continue with the Home Grown School Feeding project in schools during the lockdown, I was triggered. How can she say she will be giving school children food during this lockdown?
“I am calling on President Muhammadu Buhari to call the minister to order because as a school administrator, I find it strange that someone will say she wants to go and give food to children who are under lock and key in their parent’s house. I regard this as not only fraud or an embarrassment but also a disgrace to Nigerians and the nation as a whole as well as a slight on the intelligence of Nigerians and the international community. If she is doing it in her own state, it is pardonable but this is a national issue which will extend into an international affair, that is why we will not close our eyes or keep quiet about this,” she said.
She said the president needs to call the minister to order “so she can stop this game of fraud and international embarrassment to Nigeria as a whole. If you want to give the children food, you tell each school to get the name of parents and their wards with phone numbers, can she identify the homes of these children? Can any principal tell you categorically that she knows the homes and addresses of students in his school, these are little kids; do they have their identity? Which data is she working with?”
According to her, if the process is done the right way, they don’t have to distribute food because the money that will be spent on caterers and everyone involved in the process can be used for something else adding that, “if you want to help these children, let the school supply the data of the students and their parents; name, age, class, addresses of parents and bank accounts, send money to the parents to cater for their children as necessary.
“If they want to distribute food, there should be a food point. But at this period, no child can walk anywhere to take the food because they are home and schools are not open. So they should stop this idea that they are going to distribute food to pupils during lockdown because it is a disgrace and an embarrassment even to the president himself. In a country with highly educated people that is competing in the comity of nations, how can one woman just stand up and say you want to distribute food at this time, to which pupils? The one she said she did even when school was on was a fraud not to talk of when the children are still under lock and key, you cannot open schools, teachers have even been stopped from going to peoples’ homes for home lessons. Something must be done about this woman that wants to distribute food to pupils who are under lock and key
“Then how do you identify them? Can you even tell them to be brought to a place, how do you ensure they maintain social distancing? Enough is enough. President Buhari should do something with immediate effect to save the nation from this disgrace and fraud,” she said.
Speaking further on the almajirai scattered across the country, Chief Doherty said the government should adopt all children on the street as government children, adding that to put an end to this menace, parents of children found on the street must be penalised and made to face the law and such children taken away from them or given up for adoption.
“There must be a department for little children to oversee the welfare of children; governmen tot must see all children as the children of the government so that no parent will mess up with them. The president should take interest in the kids because they are the foundation of tomorrow,” she said.
