A group, the Akoko Concerned Youths (ACY), has kicked against the resolutions of the stakeholders at the Education summit which recommended that free education in Ondo state should be discontinued at Secondary school level.
The youth organization warned governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu against implementing the policies as such act will definitely spell doom for his administration
Adedotun Olomolatan, national coordinator of ACY accused the state government of not involving students leaders which it described as a sign of unseriousness, insincerity, and lack of purpose on the part of the government.
"Our attention has been drawn to recent publications of Ondo state Government in several print and electronic media on the 30th of October 2017 which reads in part: "The government should fund education at the primary school level, while parents should be responsible for the education of their children at the secondary and tertiary levels."
"As a responsible youth group in the state with the sole aim of addressing critical issues as it affects Citizens of Ondo State particularly from the North Senatorial District, it becomes imperative to unequivocally condemn in clear terms this regretable indirect approach of the state government to inflict more pains on Ondo Indigenes.
"The Education summit organized by the state government which witnessed a near zero turnout of student union leaders from the state tertiary institutions and other student leaders who presently occupy sensitive offices at National and Zonal levels of various student associations.
"That these students leaders were not duely invited shows unseriousness, insincerity and lack of purpose on the part of the state government.
"That students are major stakeholders in the education sector is a major fact that cannot be overemphasized, as such we have been in due consultations with the student and youth leaders from our constituency and we hereby advise the state government to desist from any act or policy that could lead to increment in the existing tuition fee of tertiary institution or reversal of the existing free primary and secondary education policy of the state government."
Speaking further, Olomolatan who is also the Director of Students Security and Welfare, National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS said: "Such attempts either directly or indirectly shall be fully resisted with equal and opposite vigour!
"We believe that the increment of tuition fees is not the better way to venture into whenever the quest for increasing IGR arise. As such, the government should also organised programmes where better ideas can be sought from young people on how to generate more funds for the state.
"Moreover, it is also pertinent to call the attention of the state government to the totally dilapidated roads in the state, especially within and around the Ondo North Senatorial District and Akoko regions specifically.
"It is sacrosanct to note that the Ibillo to Akoko roads and the Isua-Oka-Akungba-Owo roads which are very instrumental to the Socioeconomic living of our parents in terms of transporting their farm products from the rural areas to the city centres are now completely dilapidated, amounting to increase in the sufferings of our parents who mostly depends on their farms for a living."
