SMEDAN Boss Laments Poor Reading Culture among Students

Francis Sardauna

The Managing-Director of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), Dr. Umar Dikko Radda, has lamented the declining rate of reading culture among Nigerian students.

Radda, who spoke in Katsina yesterday while donating 5,000 textbooks to public and private secondary schools in Batagarawa Local Government Area of the state, said reading culture among youth was abysmally low in the country.

The textbooks donated were Basic technology, Comprehensive mathematics and English, National values, Comprehensive Economics, Islamic studies, Agricultural science, Brilliant English, Biology, Business studies, Food and Nutrition, Fundamental of cultural and creative art, Physics, among others.

He said the trend no doubt poses a potent catalyst for the distortion of societal norms and values, as the youth are the heart of development in any human society.

“The problem fencing the education sector is because of a lack of reading culture among Nigerian students. If we want to succeed in education, we must improve the reading culture among our children.This is my Foundation, Gwagware Foundation, deems it worthy to donate 5,000 textbooks to public and private secondary schools in Batagarawa Local Government Area. This is part of our effort to support the state government in boosting education,”he said.

The SMEDAN boss explained the government alone couldn’t tackle the challenges besetting the education sector because of the mono-economic system of the country, hence the need for stakeholders to support the government’s effort in revamping education.

The state Commissioner for Education, Lawal Badamasi Charanchi, who received the textbooks on behalf of the state government, warned principals of the benefiting schools against selling the textbooks to their students.