Lagos pupils win N500k, scholarship in Lafarge literacy competition

Lawal Kehinde and Idowu Ayomikun, nine and 11-year-old pupils from Lagos state, have emerged winners of the fifth Lafarge Africa National Literacy Competition.

The duo was declared winners on Thursday at the finals of the event which held at Civic Centre, Lagos.

There were 10 other participants, two each representing Kano, River, Nassarawa, Gombe and Ebonyi states.

Kehinde and Ayomikun are primary six students of St. Augustine Primary School, Somolu, and Diary Farm Primary School, Agege, Lagos respectively.

The competition, which is in its fifth year, is open to children between ages nine and 13 years.

Kano State came sixth, Rivers was fifth, Nassarawa (fourth), Gombe (third) while Ebonyi emerged second in the competition.

The first to third place winners got cash prizes of N250,000, N150,000 and N100,000 respectively.

The overall winners from Lagos also got scholarships to complete their secondary school education.

According to Bolaji Balogun, chairman of Lafarge Africa, the competition is an intervention in Nigeria’s education sector.

“Nigeria’s real wealth is not in its crude oil but in its people,” he said.

“However, the nation’s annual budget is spent on the wrong things, recurrent expenditure and debt servicing, with less than nine percent allocated to education

He said the competition was organised across all 109 senatorial districts in all 36 states of the federation and the FCT.

Balogun said the organisers worked with implementation partners such as State Universal Basic Education Commission (SUBEBs) across Nigeria, Ovie Brume Foundation, OANDO Foundation, UNESCO and British Council.