No fewer than 47 persons living with disabilities (PWDs) have enrolled for the 2025 West Africa Examinations Council (WAEC) and National Examinations Council (NECO) in Borno State.
This is even as the special school for the PWDs in the state has appealed to the state government and North East Development Commission (NEDC) to establish an entrepreneurship centre in the school for the training of the students of the school on skills acquisition.
Speaking to LEADERSHIP in an exclusive interview, the principal of the school, Hauwa Kuji Warkani, said the school is at present having about 300 students mostly visually impaired , deaf and dumb.
She said with the establishment of the entrepreneurship centre, some of the students who are adults could be trained on skills such as soap making, cosmetology, tailoring, bead making, handsets repairs among others to curtail the tradition of roaming the streets for alms.
She said the students who would be finishing their school certificate examinations soon would immediately enrol for the next Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), adding that the special school would assist parents of PWDs to give education and skills to their children.
The principal said even though the commissioner for education had upgraded the school with facilities, what it is still asking the government to do is to equip the laboratory under construction.
She said, “Another aspect is the entrepreneurship training we want to start with the students. Students living with disabilities might not necessarily go for formal education from beginning to the end. Some are gifted and therefore, we look at it paramount to have an entrepreneurship centre, which we have requested and the government has promised to support.
” We wish to see some students having skills training such as tailoring, shoe making, cosmetology, solar installation, phone repairs among others. When you take them through that, at the end, they will be independent, especially those that have outgrown primary education. And when they come, you will notice that they have never enrolled in any education.
“Bu,t we never reject them, we still enrol them so that we teach them social cohesion and some basic ways of life. They can wash, bath themselves, which they couldn’t do before. ”
Meanwhile, some visually impaired who are in the Borno special school have appealed for financial assistance from the government and non-governmental organisations to source out materials for various skills they have acquired.
Fatima Mukhtar, a visually impaired graduate of mass communication from Abubakar Tatari Politechnic Bauchi, affiliate of the University of Maiduguri, who have acquired skill in cosmetology such as soap making, petroleum jelly, airfreshener among others, lamented that despite acquiring the skill and assisting her family with the little income she is making, finance to source local materials to expand her production has been her challenge.
Facing similar challenge , Fatima Ibrahim who had also acquired skill in cosmetology lamented her inability to raise capital to source for the local materials required for the production of things like soap, airfreshener, beads among others.
She calls for financial empowerment from government, non governmental organisations and individuals to enable her and her colleagues who have acquired these skills to eke a living and support family needs.
