Anthony Iwuoma
The Senator, representing Imo North in the National Assembly, Sir Frank Ibezim, has launched scheme to sensitize schoolchildren on sexual abuse.
Ibezim, who also flagged off an ambitious classroom libraries project to revive reading habit in students, said he decided to initiate the projects in the primary schools in order to catch the children young and push them back to reading as well as prepare them to protect themselves against sexual assault.
The senator used the occasion to make the children aware of their body parts, the private ones and those that are off limits to others.
He took them through a reading session during which he actually read with them: “My private parts are not for touching. I will tell you if you touch it.’ Nobody should ever touch your body and ask you to keep it secret. There are good and bad secrets. Good secrets can be things like surprise parties or presents. Bad secrets make you feel sad, worried or scared.
“There are good and bad touches too. Never agree to keep bad touches a secret. Sometimes it can be hard to tell an adult. Don’t ever be afraid to tell your parents, grandparents, teacher, imam or any adult you trust.”
He said: “We have to catch these children young again. So, that’s why we introduced the classroom libraries. Part of what we are trying to do is to teach the teachers on how to also get the parents to try to read to every child 20 minutes a day. They sign off on it and the child will bring it with the book then read it to the teacher.”
During the launch of the first phase of the library project in the two federal constituencies of Imo North Senatorial Zone, Okigwe North and Okigwe South, Ibezim donated books and shelves worth millions of naira to set up the classroom libraries in five schools in each of the two federal constituencies in Okigwe Zone, making a total of 10 libraries in all.
The senator also talked about plans to motivate the children by giving them some incentives.
“We will come back in another month to see the improvements. And any child that does exceptionally well we have a token price for them.
He also charged well placed individuals in the state to embrace the school library project, saying government alone cannot do everything.
Ibezim explained that the idea is to get the cooperation of these well-placed Nigerians to set up libraries that would be named after them in schools of their own choice.
“We can now get the private sector to now donate libraries to their own schools and when you donate to their own schools, you put your names on them and then make sure that those people will make sure that the teachers know exactly what you want to do. And we will encourage a reward system, the parents will be involved so that we get it right, the parents will be involved, the teachers will be involved, the students will be involved and we can make our children the best they can be.’
Speaking with representatives of the Imo State Universal Basic Education Board, IMSUBEB, school heads and teachers, Ibezim urged them to take the library project seriously and protect them to ensure that the objective for setting them up would be achieved, saying that leaders are readers.
