From Ahmed Mohammed, Bauchi
Governor Bala Mohammed has renovated 89-year-old Yelwa Practicing Schools under Sustainable Development Goals Programmes and executed 5.5 billion projects under UBEC/SUBEB joint projects across the 20 local government areas of the State.
State Chairman of the State Universal Basic Education Board SUBEB Dr Abubakar Surumbai Sheikh Dahiru and the Sites (SDGs), Mukhtar Mohammed Musa disclosed this when they separately received a team of Journalist led by the State Commissioner of Information Alhaji Garba Dahiru to inspect projects executed by the Governor across the state within the last one year of the administration.
Dr Surumbai said when they came on board the governor inherited rotten and dilapidated primary schools many with blown up roofs, nor furniture’s, talk less of boreholes and other learning and instructional materials in both Primary and Junior Secondary Schools across the State.
He said the government paid 50 per cent of the amount which is 2.750,000,000 and UBEC put the same amount and kick start the projects which included 470 brand new classrooms blocks, many where renovated, we constructed boreholes, VIP toilets and we provided over 20,000 desk and chairs for Primary School pupils across the State.
Dr Surumbai who was Represented by Engineer Bello Zubairu the Chairman said all the projects were executed on the in tandem with standard specification.
Sites (SDGs), Mukhtar said the Yelwa Practicing School of the former Bauchi Teachers College, that the school established in 1931 was fully renovated and a solar-powered borehole sunk in its premises, which was also fenced.
He explained that 16 various projects across the state were either newly constructed or renovated under collaborative efforts between the State Office of SDGs and the Conditional Grant Scheme (CGS) of the Federal Government with 50 per cent each counterpart funding.
Engr. Mukhtar explained that the projects which were executed in hard-to-reach areas of the state included the provision of equipment, furniture, as well as teaching and learning materials.
He said under SDGs projects executed by the state government across the state at a total cost of N500 million aimed at promoting the development of basic education.
The journalists inspected the 1.75 kmYakubun Bauchi-Raji quarters access road, the 4.2km Gombe – Maiduguri bye-pass and the 1.1km Muda Lawa link road all 100 per cent completion were contracted at a cost of N2.5 billion.
Permanent Secretary Ministry of Works Engineer. Stephen Abubakar explained that the roads have opened up communities that hitherto lacked road infrastructure and were locked out from other neighboring areas.
The permanent secretary while describing the projects as standard ones, pointed out that they have now boosted the day-to-day businesses of people of the areas.
