Minister Nalova Lyonga was speaking Wednesday, July 7, 2021, during her visit to some schools and GCE examination centers in the South West Region.

The Minister’s first stop was in Bimbia where the government has allocated 20 hectares of land for the extension and construction of Government Technical College in Bimbia. The land will also serve the agriculture departments authorized to go operational in technical colleges.

“I give praises to the administrative people in Fako for making this possible because we are going to have the agricultural and technical school,” said Nalova Lyonga.

From Bimbia, the Minister made a stop at Ombe where she said plans are afoot for Government Technical High School (GTHS) Ombe to be given a facelift given its historical nature. The ongoing construction of an ultra-modern story-building at the 69-year-old academic facility may well be part of the government’s plans to refurbish the school which has drastically lost its standards held in 11952 when it went operational.

Enter GTHS Ombe

As far back as March 2014, teachers, students, and parents of the school lamented that GTHS Ombe, which once had the image of the best technical college west of the Mongo, can no longer boost of training students on theoretical and technical knowledge, given that its workshops are composed of equipment of antiquity.

“After going round the workshops with the students and looking at the kind of machines they are using, I can say that the standards of this school have fallen. These equipment are only good for an industrial museum,” Herbert Njoh said, wondering the kind of conditions under which his children were studying at the time.

To him, it is time for the government to improve the status of GTHS Ombe.

“Let the government hear our cry and grant us a Polytechnic here in Ombe. During our PTA meetings, we realize that the budget put at the disposal of the school by the ministry of secondary education cannot replace the decades-old equipment in the workshops,” he said.

In March 2014, Robinson Ningo of the welding and metal fabrication department said teaching with the very ancient equipment in modern times is overwhelmingly difficult.

“Our equipment are managed by the aid of adaptation due to the worn-out nature of the equipment. Our principal has been very supportive. We think that the government should come in at this point to help us,” he said.

He stated among other things that “GTHS Ombe is dead”, and that “if it is dead, it is due to the nature of the very of equipment.”

Kenye Leon, Vice Principal Industrial back in 2014 said: “We don’t have good equipment. We are trying our best, but we can only teach the theory to the students. It is difficult for us to implement modern-day knowledge on the old machines. The equipment are obsolete.”

“... most paramount, we think GTHS Ombe should be upgraded to a polytechnic which could be an arm of the college of technology in the University of Buea as a fruit of and direct benefit of celebrations marking the fiftieth anniversary of the reunification,” stated Douma Paul Laurent, then principal of GTHS Ombe.

Back in 204, it was announced that the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Regional Development had struck a deal with the Arab Development Bank for Africa (BADEA) for the restructuring of Government Technical High School (GTHS) Ombe.

According to the financing agreement, the colossal sum of 7.5 million US Dollars, an estimated FCFA 3.75 Billion was to be made available by BADEA to finance the project to construct and equip GTHS Ombe, a school found in Fako Division of the South West Region.

The project included the construction of 36 study classrooms, 10 specialized halls, 10 workshop blocks, and administrative blocks.

To this day, no sign of the vast project has been seen at GTHS Ombe.

Warning to land grabbers

Minister Nalova Lyonga of Secondary Education, during her two-day visit to the South-West region, said school land encroached into by individuals will be reclaimed.

“We are not silly to say that school land should remain school land. If they haven’t built on it, that is not a reason for the population to go there. They are the same population who will be asking for schools soon. So I am firm, the SDO is firm, the Governor is firm, our school land will be secure,” she said.