River State which hosted the Lafarge and Ovie Brume Foundation literacy contest has also emerged first, beating other South-South regional competitors with 74 points. The competition, which is organized yearly to promote literacy skills across public primary school pupils in the country and to engage them in activities that will showcase their ability to read, write and spell correctly, was on Wednesday, July 29, 2015, held in Port Harcourt.

The talks hold particular pertinence for Nigeria, where according to Unicef, despite significant increases in the country’s enrollment rates 40% of children aged six to 11 do not attend any primary school. An estimated 4.7 million Nigerian primary school aged children are not enrolled in school, and for those who are enrolled, learning attainment rates are low. These statistics are even worse in poor or rural areas, with Northern Nigeria possessing some of the worst education indicators in the world.

“I believe we are all artists. Every child given birth to is gifted, so no matter who one is or how dull one is intellectually or academically, God has given everyone a talent that is innate in him, one only needs a hand to bring and develop the talents.”

“It is not in our hand to renovate this school, else we would have done it to reduce the plight of these pupils. People have taken over the school’s land and are building on it.” “We want the government to intervene because people are taking over the land that belongs to the school. They attacked the head teacher, so we are afraid of confronting them. We use this opportunity to call on government to come and reclaim their land from people who have encroached on it. We called on the community for help some time ago, but till today no assistance.”

The reaction by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), that it was already investigating the petition of the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO), over alleged financial impropriety and abuse of office by the Rector, Yaba College of Technology, YABATECH, Lagos, Dr. Margaret Ladipo, caused a mild drama at the Lagos office of the anti-corruption agency, last Tuesday.