Irregularities characterise FG’s school feeding in Ondo

The Federal Government’s school feeding programme is still battling with teething problems three years after it was inaugurated.

Investigations have revealed that while the programme was irregular in schools it had started, many others were left out of it.

It was also learnt that only pupils in primary one to three were being fed in schools benefiting from the programme.

It was gathered that many schools in the rural and swampy areas were excluded from the programme because of the Federal Government officers’ inability to access them.

At the launch of the Home Grown School Feeding programme in 2016, the Vice-President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, said the scheme was aimed at providing free school meals.

It is also aimed at “increasing school enrolment and completion” and “improving child nutrition and health.”

Investigations by PUNCH revealed that the crisis associated with the programme had not enabled it to achieve its aims.

In Ondo State, it was observed that not all schools were benefiting from the feeding programme. In schools benefiting, only primary one to three are being fed.

A teacher in the state said, “Only pupils in primary one to three are being fed.

She added that the vendors have not be consistent ,making the pupils to study in hunger while sometimes it was the teachers that fed them whenever such incidents occurred.

Efforts to get the reaction of the state coordinator of the programme, Olubunmi Ademosu, did not succeed as she neither picked calls to her phone nor responded to an SMS sent to her.

Source : Punch

ROVING REPORTERS will also publish more details on the news later