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From Olanrewaju Lawal, Birnin Kebbi
Victims Support Fund (VSF) Task Force on COVID-19, an NGO, has donated 4,000 litres of solar-powered boreholes and hand washing stations to three secondary schools in Kebbi State.
The three recepient schools are Government Science Secondary School Argungu; Army Day Secondary School, Birnin Kebbi; and Dominion College, Zuru.
Each of the school received a solar power borehole, 4 hand wash stations, 2,000 pieces of reusable face masks, 5 pieces of 4 litres of hand sanitizers, 120 bottles of 500ml liquid hand wash and 5 cartons of bleach.
Speaking at the symbolic commissioning of the projects at Army Day Secondary School, Birnin Kebbi, Chairperson of the VSF Task Force on COVID -19, Mrs Toyosi Akerele-Ogunsiji, explained that the projects could serve the schools and hosted communities for 20 years if properly maintained.
She disclosed that Kebbi are the 29 states to benefits from such projects since the Chairman of the VSF Task Force on COVID-19, Gen TY Danjuma (retd), inaugurated the task force in 2020, stressed that, 54 boreholes have been sunk in 54 schools across the countries.
Ogunsiji added that more than 20,000 women have benefited from the organisation’s philanthropy in northeast Nigeria, where women and children have been displaced by insurgents, stressing that their second and third phases of the VSF distribution of relief items have covered the south-south, north-central and northwest, respectively.
In his remark, Kebbi State Governor Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, represented by Secretary to the State Government (SSG) Alhaji Babale Umar Yauri, commended the organisation for their humanitarian gesture, and noted that the present administration are not playing with education issue in the state.
‘The Government of Kebbi State is always giving concern to projects going on in the state, especially projects being sponsor and executed by voluntary organisations. For siting this project in the school environment, it would have a multiply effects on the society.
‘The state government always give priority to education and other sectors because they are the backbone of this administration. Because, once you are govern illiterate society, no development will occur.’
He appealed to the students and the host communities to use and maintain the facilities judiciously.
Also speaking at the event, the wife of the governor, Dr Zainab Shinkafi Bagudu, represented by the Special Adviser to the Governor of Women Affairs, Hajiya Zarau Wali, thanked VSF for their venture, saying the projects were not only meant for the students of the schools, but for the people of Kebbi State.
The Principal of Army Day Secondary School, Birnin Kebbi, Alhaji Abubakar Sambo, noted that the projects would protect their students from contracting diseases.
