From Joseph Asegba, Yola
In the shadow of Adamawa’s Government House, where decisions affecting millions are made, more than a thousand children sit on bare floors, write their future under trees and relieve themselves in the bush.
Dougirei Government Day Secondary School, Yola, stands just beyond the walls of the seat of power. Its toilets are locked for lack of water. Its classrooms are weakened by flooding and erosion. Its students sit external WAEC and NECO examinations under trees, while the Vice Principal receives visitors seated on a mat at the staff-room entrance.
This is not a school in a remote village. It is located in one of Yola’s better neighbourhoods, sharing a boundary with the Government House itself. Yet, for its students—many of them children from vulnerable households—going to school has become an exercise in endurance and quiet fear.
The Daily Reality
Classrooms have broken ceilings that open to the sky, providing entry points for reptiles. Roofs leak so badly that lessons during the rainy season become an exercise in dodging dripping water.
Desks and chairs are either scarce or broken beyond use. Many students sit on bare floors, window ledges or blocks.
Teachers bring their own mats, while some leave the cramped staff room on hot days to teach or mark students’ papers under trees.
There is no functional water supply, despite the school’s proximity to the Adamawa State Water Board headquarters. Consequently, the toilets are unusable, forcing students—especially girls—to use the surrounding bush.
The school also has no science laboratory, despite offering science subjects, and no examination hall. When external examinations are held, candidates sit under trees, hoping the weather remains favourable.
Only about 24 teachers serve more than 1,000 students, and the shortage is evident in the overcrowded classrooms.
Water That Drowns Learning
Perhaps the most dangerous threat comes from above and from next door.
Stormwater from the Government House is channelled into the school premises.
Following heavy rainfall, the compound is flooded by fast-flowing water.
Academic activities have been suspended on such occasions, while gully erosion continues to eat away at the school grounds. Some classroom blocks already show signs of structural strain.
Journalists who visited the school encountered uneven, water-damaged ground, highlighting the danger faced by children who walk across the compound every day.
The school’s Parent-Teacher Association Chairman, Alhaji Mohammed Usman, said he had written repeatedly to the Ministry of Education over the deteriorating condition of the institution.
“I am tired of writing letters,” he said. “We are now waiting for God’s intervention, not man’s.”
Promises and Budgets
Governor Ahmadu Fintiri’s administration has declared education a priority. It has introduced free education and school-feeding programmes and announced plans to establish model secondary schools across the state’s 21 local government areas.
Budget figures show substantial allocations to education in recent years, rising to more than ₦40 billion in both 2025 and 2026.
Yet, at Dougirei, a school established more than a decade ago and located almost within sight of the seat of power, basic facilities remain absent.
During a visit by journalists from the Correspondents’ Chapel, the school was found in a state of serious distress. Attempts to speak with the Commissioner for Education that week yielded no response.
The Unanswered Question
What becomes of the children already enrolled in public schools while plans are being made to establish new model institutions?
At Dougirei, the answer is visible every morning: bare floors, locked toilets, leaking roofs, examinations under trees and the constant threat of floodwater from the very seat of government.
The school stands as a quiet, daily indictment—close enough to power to be seen, yet still waiting to be heard.
