School reopening: FG seeks cooperation of private owners

The Federal Government has called for cooperation from owners of private institutions of learning ahead of school reopening.

The Minister of State for Education, Emeka Nwajiuba, on Wednesday, made this known during a briefing by the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 in Abuja.

The minister said the government was working on modalities to achieve social distancing and good hygiene practices before schools could be allowed to reopen.

He also described as false, reports that schools would reopen in the country on June 8, saying the government could not afford to take any expensive risk.

Nwajiuba said, “We are going to publish a specification on what we expect COVID-19 or post-COVID-19 reopening to look like. We are not talking about coping with COVID-19 but in spite of COVID-19, we expect that we will adapt.

“For a country that has over 115,000 primary schools, you will understand that 35,000 of these who are private must agree to set up the same standard in other to allow children to go in.”

Earlier, the PTF Chairman, Boss Mustapha, urged all school administrators to start taking steps that would aid school reopening.

“We urge states, local governments, proprietors and all other stakeholders to begin to take steps that will facilitate an early and safe reopening,” the Secretary to the Government of the Federation said.

It was learnt that the FG shut all schools in the country in March as part of measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.