It is disheartening that the tremendous increase in illiteracy is majorly as a result of the alleged overwhelming rate of embezzlement of funds allocated for the construction of schools by way of Federal Constituency Projects in the country, despite Nigeria’s public education system which expedites Junior secondary and primary forms of basic education generally seen as key to the betterment of the society. This embezzlement is evidently seen in the abandoned proposed three classroom block at Community Secondary School, Oku Uyo in Akwa Ibom State nominated in the 2018 constituency projects by Senator Bassey Albert Akpan as it is clearly visible that he has failed to deliver his promise of providing a good learning environment for his constituents during his election campaign.
We gathered that in 2018, N30,000, 000 million (Thirty Million Naira) was earmarked as a Federal Constituency Project for the construction of three (3) classroom blocks at Community Secondary School, Oku Uyo which was meant to elevate the educational challenges of the indigenes of Oku but regrettably, since last year no single construction work was carried out on the proposed site with the only visible attempt on site being the sand and gravel which were supplied last year. This has made indigenes of Oku community who understands the importance of education and in a bid to ensure they acquire knowledge feel cheated and deprived of basic education with most of their children subjected to trekking long distances to attend schools.
This online news medium also learned that surprisingly, Akwa Ibom State which prides as the “Promise Land” with its oil wealth has a shortage of public schools despite the huge allocation to Education sector in the state budget by the government with over N400 billion allocated yearly to the Ministry of Education nationwide. There are conjectures that the Federal Constituency Projects are obliquely swindling government funds through its nominees and implementing agencies as there seems no explanation for most funds nominated by those saddled to represent the people in the national assembly. The Senator did not respond when contacted by our reporter before going to press.