Babatunde Fashola Announces Oct 8 As Resumption Date For Schools In Lagos State.

Lagos State governor, Mr Babatunde Fashola, on Sunday, announced Monday, October 8, as new date for resumption of schools in the state for academic work.

He said the one week extension from Monday 22 would be used to conclude the distribution of personal hygiene and other preventive materials against Ebola infection in all the schools.

Making the announcement at a meeting with teachers of public schools in the state at the LTV Blue Roof Hall, Governor Fashola said the October 8 date was arrived at by the state executive council, after considering the fact that the Eid-el-Kabir public holidays was already around the corner, adding that it would not be ideal to break the school programme again soon after resumption.

Addressing the capacity audience of hundreds of teachers, including principals, vice-principals, tutors general, head teachers and their deputies, as well as executive members of the state chapter of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) and other education stakeholders, Fashola reiterated that the Ebola virus disease had been contained in the state.

The governor, who identified with the anxiety of the teachers as genuine, however, said the state had reached the point where the government must have to take a decision on when to open the schools.

“We can compare and contrast what is the experience in other states; those experiences can only guide us, they cannot bind us.” 

Arguing that the experiences are different, Fashola declared “some states that may want to re-open tomorrow (Monday) didn’t have an outbreak of Ebola; Patrick Sawyer didn’t land in their states, he landed here.”

He said the government had made every arrangement, including training of teachers on all relevant information about the disease and appointing one Ebola officer to each school in the state, should there be any suspected case of the disease in any of the schools.

Earlier, the Special Adviser to the Governor on Public Health, Dr (Mrs) Yewande Adeshina, had assured the teachers that the Ebola virus disease had been finally contained, adding that necessary preventive materials against the disease had been sent to the education district offices for distribution to the schools.

Earlier in his remarks, chairman of the state chapter of NUT, Adesegun Raheem, said the teachers were only anxious to know when the preventive materials which government promised would reach all the schools.

He added that the executive council of the union had scheduled a meeting to take a decision on the issue before the invitation of the governor’s meeting came to them.

Expressing the readiness of the teachers to return to school, Raheem said even if it became necessary to shift the date in order to get the preventive materials across to all the schools, the teachers would work to catch up on any lost academic time when the schools finally resume.