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The Lagos State Government (LASG), on Monday, March 11, 2024, informed Justice Oyindamola Ogala of an Ikeja High Court, that Chrisland Schools, Opebi, Ikeja, violated the Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy of the state.
Jubril Yakubu, a Deputy Director with the Ministry of Youth and Social Development in the state, stated this while testifying before the judge.
Yakubu confirmed that the Ministry’s findings show that the school’s preparedness for the emergency during the inter-house sport was close to none because they had just one nurse and there was no available ambulance to convey any student to the hospital in case of any emergency and casualties.
The late Whitney, a student of Chrisland Schools, Opebi, died of an alleged electrocution on February 9, 2023, during an Inter-house sports competition that was held at the Agege Stadium.
The above development made the LASG institute charges bordering on negligence against the school and its Principal, Vice-Principal and two others for the death of Whitney on March 31, 2023.
While being led in evidence by the counsel for the state government, Dr Babajide Martins, Yakubu revealed further that the school did not have a designated Child Safeguarding Protection Policy personnel as required by the Safeguarding Executive Order of the state.
The witness, said, “The Safety Policy demands that there should be a retainer hospital that is close to the venue, but in the case of Chrisland, there was none.
“The designated Safety Protection Child Policy officer takes the lead responsibility in terms of risk and every other information surrounding the place of the event of such magnitude, but in the case of Chrisland Schools, they don’t have any.”
Yakubu who also revealed that he is the state coordinator for all the districts in the state, maintained that there are over 1,722 private and public secondary schools, and they are divided into districts based on their locations.
In his words: “We have a Safeguarding and Child Protection Alliance group, which comprises all relevant agencies that ensure child safety, and we called for an emergency virtual meeting immediately after we heard of the issue.
“We concluded to meet physically on Monday, February 13, 2023, at the conference room of the Ministry of Education.
“The meeting was chaired by Mrs Folashade Adefisayo and other members. After the meeting, we invited Chrisland staff and management the next day, and they honoured the invitation.
“In attendance was the Principal, Mrs Belinda Amoo, the school nurse, the school instructor, Mr Kuku, Mrs Adebisi, the head of Green House, Mrs Onyema, the legal counsel.
“The meeting was a fact-finding meeting and the intention was for the school to provide us first-hand information about what transpired at the inter-house sport, and we all asked questions based on our professional knowledge.
“Through the findings, it was discovered that the school has over 556 students out of which 377 were prepared to participate, over 500 of them were transported to the venue by the school, and we discovered that the Safety and Child Protection Policy have been violated because they took the over 500 pupils to the venue without safety clearance.
“Our findings show a case of non-compliance with safeguarding and child protection on the part of the school.
“We have also investigated a case of bullying regarding a child in Chrisland School and another case of negligence on the students who were taken to Dubai.”
The continuation of the trial on the criminal case has been adjourned until March 13, 2024.
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