Borno state governor, Professor Babagana Umara Zulum has announced the intention of his government to employ 5,000 teachers.
The governor made the announcement during his inauguration address in Maiduguri after taking the oath of office for a second term.
As part of measures to improve the standard of education in Borno State, Governor Zulum also announced the introduction of afternoon primary and secondary school system during his second term in office.
He said, “Although we have built dozens of new mega-size schools and expanded existing schools with about 1000 new classrooms, we are still faced with issues of congestion in classrooms, and the problem of out-of-school children”.
Consequently, he added: “I am happy to announce that Borno State will soon commence afternoon primary and secondary school system. I am appointing an implementation committee to work out modalities for starting the afternoon school system and the committee will identify pilot schools to be selected from some of our mega schools in Maiduguri which have good lightening systems.”
Zulum said that introducing afternoon schools would entail an increase in staff and for that, he directed the office of the Head of Service to carefully identify some well-certificated staff currently redundant at government secretariats, who will be trained and can be deployed to hold non-teaching positions in afternoon schools.
The governor also said security measures will be taken to ensure the success of the afternoon schools noting that classes may sometimes extend to early portions of the night.
Zulum said other measures such as mock examinations in secondary schools will be re-introduced and centres of excellence will be established to allow government to harness the potential of the less privileged children.
Emmanuel Ukoh
