A benevolent governor and the education of his people

By Dr. Dons Eze

Education, the art of developing the human mind, is key to every success in life. A wise leader gives priority to the education of his subjects, since an uneducated population is a burden to the society at large.

Philosopher Plato sees education as a means of achieving justice, both at the individual and at the social levels. Knowledge, for Plato, as for Socrates, is virtue, while ignorance is vice. Thus, knowledge is essential if one must obtain both individual and social justice.

While individual justice is obtained when each individual develops his or her ability to the fullest, social justice is achieved when all social classes, workers, warriors, and rulers, are in a harmonious relationship, when the society gives them equal educational opportunity from an early age to compete fairly with each other. Without equal educational opportunity, there will be an unjust society, Plato had deposed.

One of the first actions taken by Rt. Hon. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi when he assumed the mantle of leadership as Governor of Enugu State in 2015, was to ensure that the degree students of the Enugu State College of Education Technical (ESCET), who for years were held down due to non-accreditation of their courses, got full accreditation, and thus were later graduated.

The Governor followed this up by promptly paying similar attention to the various needs of other tertiary institutions in the state, like the Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), the Institute of Management Technology (IMT), Enugu, and the Enugu State Polytechnic, Iwollo.

Governor Ugwuanyi has gone further to establish a University of Education at Ihe, in Awgu local government area, the first of its kind in the country, and proposed to return ESUT to its multi-campus structure by opening a new campus of the institution at Enugu North Senatorial district.

These are some of the many actions taken at the tertiary level by Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, who no doubt, is genuinely committed to ensure the educational attainment of the people of Enugu State.

The recent report of the approval of bursary awards for 246 student indigenes of Enugu State at the Nigerian law school, is a further testimony of Gov. Ugwuanyi’s interest and love for education in Enugu State.

According to a statement by the Executive Secretary, Enugu State Scholarship and Education Loans Board (ESSELB), Mr. Levis Uche Abonyi, the Enugu State Government had approved the release of N24. 6 million for Bursary allowance to 246 students of the state indigene at the Nigeria Law Schools, with each beneficiary student getting the sum of one hundred thousand naira.

The Executive Secretary explained that those eligible for the offer must be indigenes of Enugu State, and who are in the Nigerian Law Schools, and in possession of valid admission letters; valid Law school ID cards; local government area identification letters duly signed by the Scholarship Board staff at their LGA, as well as recent passport photographs.

The bursary award, particularly coming at this austere time, is a mark of benevolence on the part of a Governor who, no doubt, is deeply concerned with the progress and welfare of his people, and who also would not want to see the genuine dreams of any of his subjects to be aborted.

There is no gainsaying the fact that there are a good number of law students from Enugu State who had completed their University education, but could not to go to law school, due to its heavy financial involvement. They therefore were thus stranded, and in the process became frustrated.

With this kind gesture by Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi through the Enugu State Scholarship Board, these hitherto-thought aborted dreams, are now being realized, which we all must extol.