Fred Itua, Abuja
The Rochas Foundation has earmarked about N1 billion to return out-of-school children to the classroom. The Foundation also said it is partnering the Federal Ministry of Education on the project.
Director-General of the Foundation, Ucy Okorocha, told journalists in Abuja that over 5,737 students are in various schools across the country courtesy of the Foundation. She also said about 20,000 orphans and underprivileged children have been educated since the establishment of the foundation in in 1998 by Senator Rochas Okorocha.
“Rochas Foundation is budgeting the sum of N1 billion for this programme. This fund will be disbursed through NGO’s who are found to be credible to help pursue this cause in their various localities where they exist,” Okorocha said.
She said as part of efforts to extend the horizon of the free education outside Nigeria, the Foundation established the Rochas Foundation College For Africa where children from less privilege background inthe continent enjoy free and qualitative education at no cost to their country.
“The vision to give scholarships to at least five indigent kids from each of the 55 African countries is daily yielding fruitful results as students are arriving daily to benefit from the laudable initiative. At the last count, we have 148 kids from 19 different countries across the continent,” Okorocha said.