11th March, 2011
The wife of Rivers State, Governor of Rivers State, Chibuike Amaechi, Judith, founder of the Empowerment Support Initiative (ESI), a non-government organisation, based in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, has charged politicians not to play politics with early childhood education, blaming them for the collapse in the education sector.
Judith, founder of the NGO, stated this on Wednesday in a statement signed by Her Media Assistant, Mr Dike Bekwele.
She said successive government including politicians have never given attention to early childhood and kindergarten education in Nigeria and wondered why it has become issues for political parties electioneering campaign.
According to her, if politicians and political parties had appreciated the impact of foundational and early childhood education to national development, and made policy that will promote it, Nigeria will not have records of 4.7 million illiterate children and another 11 million who cannot read and write.
Mrs Amaechi said ESI has a school enrolment of over 3755 pupils across the 9 Local Government Areas of Rivers State so far, adding that successive governments in the past have failed to make practicable policy for kindergarten education, and she warned that the future of the children should not be continually sacrificed on the altar of politics.
She decried that children have been neglected educationally at an early stage and this has contributed to the growing population of illiterate children whose rights to access quality education are denied and exposed to societal vices including child labour.
—Okafor Ofiebor/Port Harcourt
