The Oyo State governor, Engr Seyi Makinde has recently approved the release of N526 million as running costs for all the government owned schools in the State.
The State government also confirmed that the sum of N400 million has been advanced to the secondary schools, while the 2500 primary schools in the state got the sum of N126 million.
The amount is to cover the running grants of the schools for the first term of the 2019/2020 academic session.
According to the State government, principals of secondary schools as well as the heads of primary schools across the State have been mandated to open accounts to receive the running grants and all the schools should have been credited except those who failed to supply the required account details on time.
There are 640 secondary schools spread across the state, which have already started benefitting from the N1,000 per child per term budget for the schools.
The Governor explained that, “With the number of students in the secondary schools put at 400,000 and at N1,000 per child, the State would be spending the sum of N400 million a term on the secondary schools. The final figure for secondary schools would terminate at N1.2 billion per session.
He noted that the N126 million approved for the primary schools has been released to the heads of the various schools.
Whereas the Ministry of Education is managing the disbursements to secondary schools, the State Universal Basic Education Commission (SUBEB) is handling the disbursement to primary schools.
The government disclosed that the release of the funds was a fulfilment of Governor Seyi Makinde’s free education policy, which is already yielding positive results across the State, charging all stakeholders in the school system to judiciously apply the funds and also take note of the fact that the government would demand accountability on every kobo released to the schools.
Makinde warned that, “on no account should any school administrator join forces with unscrupulous elements who are seeking to derail the free education policy, which the government of the day is diligently implementing.”
The State government affirmed it would deal decisively with anyone caught attempting to derail the free and qualitative education policy or extorting students under whatever guise.
