Lagos, Nigeria – Mujanatu Musa’s one-roomed condo – constructed primarily of rusty iron sheets – cuts a sorry sight in Ajegunle, a sprawling slum in Nigeria’s financial hub of Lagos.
Flanked by previous, decrepit buildings, the makeshift construction shelters the 40-year-old mom and her three kids, Abdulrahman, 12, and 9-year-old twins, Abdulwaris and Abdulmalik.
Since Musa and her husband separated greater than three years in the past, the household has been dwelling on her irregular earnings of about 2,000 naira ($1.30) a day from hairdressing work. In dry spells when there aren’t any clients, she is compelled to borrow cash from neighbours, she stated.
Occasions are robust for the household, who match into the fold of the 133 million, or 63 p.c, of Nigeria’s inhabitants dwelling in multidimensional poverty, in line with authorities information.
If not for the privately run faculty in the neighborhood that prices low tuition and permits underprivileged dad and mom to pay faculty charges with used plastic bottles, the kids would haven’t any entry to formal training, Musa stated.
“Their father has left us since 2020. The plastic is what helps me pay their tuition,” the mom instructed Al Jazeera.
“I couldn’t afford to ship them to high school. My kids and I are all the time selecting up used plastic bottles round us.
“They know their training is dependent upon it, and we even go to occasion venues to choose.”
Plastic for tuition
In Ajegunle and different components of Lagos, privately run and authorities faculties co-exist, however dad and mom choose the previous as a result of most public faculties are overstretched, which negatively impacts the standard of training the kids get.
Whereas all authorities faculties in Lagos are “free”, faculty managements cost roughly 5,000 naira (about $3) per pupil per time period to cowl some overhead prices.
The varsity the Musas attend, Morit Worldwide Faculty, is situated about 1km from their residence.
It was first established as a fee-paying faculty in 2010 by Patrick Mbamarah, a chemistry graduate. Tuition was initially 6,000 naira ($3.66) per time period, however most dad and mom and guardians within the space couldn’t afford it.
After excellent charges piled up and the losses began affecting the varsity, it was compelled to close down in 2012.
Mbamarah was in a position to resume operations in 2014, but it was on the verge of being crippled by debt but once more when he got here up with a “plastic-for-tuition” initiative.
“I used to be strolling down the road in the future when the sight of plastic bottles scattered in all places struck me,” he instructed Al Jazeera. “That is cash,” Mbamarah thought to himself.
He determined that for individuals who couldn’t afford to pay tuition in naira, he’d enable them to pay in used polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles and sachet water waste, which the varsity would accumulate after which ship out for recycling – incomes them some cash.
“I launched it to the dad and mom instead technique of paying their kids’s faculty charges whereas additionally preserving the surroundings clear. They embraced the concept wholeheartedly,” Mbamarah stated.
Rising up in Ajegunle, a closely populated low-income neighbourhood, Mbamarah misplaced his means on the streets as a teen. He was hooked on medication and indulged in different vices, which, he stated, virtually wrecked him earlier than training helped give him a second likelihood at an honest life.
Buoyed by the resolve to forestall underprivileged kids from struggling related challenges he confronted as a teen, he established the first faculty. He later based a secondary faculty in the neighborhood, working tirelessly to get each establishments operating.
“We at the moment have 158 college students: 112 within the main faculty, together with my 3 youngsters, and 46 within the secondary faculty. The tutoring is now 10,000 naira (about $6) for main faculty and 21,000 naira ($13) for secondary faculty per time period. I don’t wish to cost a lot so as to not scare the dad and mom away,” he stated.
“A kilogram of plastic bottles consists of 21 models offered for 100 naira. This implies the tutoring for a pupil is equal to 100kg,” he defined, saying dad and mom who select to pay in plastic all the time meet their quota.
Fears the varsity may shut
When Morit Worldwide first began, there have been 5 pupils, together with certainly one of Mbamarah’s kids. Within the years since, enrolments have elevated and, with it, the quantity of plastic bottles on the faculty has swelled.
Whereas ordinarily this could be a blessing, the cost scheme has created logistical points which have confirmed an even bigger problem – and price – than Mbamarah anticipated.
Each week, dad and mom convey within the plastic cost, however there isn’t any storage facility on web site to maintain tonnes of bottles for days, Mbamarah defined.
Hiring a pick-up van to often carry them to recycling factors on the market comes at an enormous value that significantly drains the varsity’s proceeds.
A number of recyclers who present such service totally free or at a bit of value solely come for pick-up often, he added.
The logistics disaster is now affecting faculty operations. It has restricted the “plastic-for-tuition” initiative to solely the first faculty, placing the entire venture on the cusp of extinction.
Mbamarah has additionally needed to reduce on the gathering of plastic bottles as a result of they find yourself littering the varsity premises, inflicting environmental issues the initiative seeks to unravel within the first place.
“Plastic waste in Ajegunle is large, however we at the moment accumulate means beneath what we must always. We accumulate about 500kg each two weeks, whereas we are able to truly get no less than 2 tonnes [2,000 kg] per week,” he stated.
“Mother and father convey sufficient plastic bottles, however most occasions they take them again house as a result of we don’t have area to maintain them. I work with two recycling corporations, however they hardly come on time to choose. So each the varsity and the dad and mom typically have extra plastic bottles.”
With the challenges and prices, the proprietor stated he’s additionally defaulting on the reimbursement of loans he took from two banks to pay lease and employees salaries.
He had borrowed 300,000 naira ($183) to resume the first faculty’s yearly lease in December 2023, whereas that of the secondary faculty gulps 800,000 naira ($488) yearly.
“A time will come once I received’t be capable to pay the lease once more, and so they [the property owners] will simply ask us to depart the varsity premises. I worry that in a really quick time I received’t be capable to run the [primary] faculty once more. I’ve been doing all the pieces to chop prices,” he stated.
Mbamarah stated although the first faculty wants no less than 11 academics, “we solely have 5 academics, together with my spouse and I”. The secondary faculty has seven academics, when it wants a minimal of 12.
“I train in each main and secondary faculties. A trainer teaches greater than two topics, and I’m nonetheless contemplating downsizing so I will pay the employees. The gap between the 2 faculties is about an 18-minute stroll. I shuttle each thrice a day. For a way lengthy can I do this? I’ll simply break down in the future,” he lamented.
‘It’s getting worse’
Rhoda Adebayo, one of many schoolteachers, equally fears the scenario may get out of hand before anticipated. When she joined the first faculty two years in the past, she was instructing seven topics.
“Now I train 13 [subjects]. It’s annoying, however the ardour retains me going. Like Mr Patrick, I additionally grew up in Ajegunle. I do know what many kids undergo. My wage may be very poor, however I discover the [plastic-for-tuition] initiative laudable and determined to help the kids.
“The varsity inhabitants retains rising. We have now been managing the scenario. Sadly, it’s getting worse. The paucity of funds is de facto telling on the varsity operations,” she stated.
A few non-profits have promised to help the varsity, however none have but redeemed their guarantees, Mbamarah stated. Some Lagos state authorities officers additionally visited the varsity final yr and promised to forge a partnership, although nothing has occurred since. Nevertheless, some people do help the varsity via donations, he added.
The varsity deserves each little bit of help from people and company our bodies to remain afloat and thrive, stated Debo Adeniyi, the CEO and chief sustainability lead at a nonprofit assume tank, the Centre for International Options and Sustainable Growth.
“The initiative is extremely commendable, and it helps the surroundings rather a lot. The quantity of plastic that goes into the surroundings, particularly water our bodies, will cut back, and invariably, the environmental influence will cut back,” he stated.
Within the meantime, Adeniyi suggested the varsity to search for extra recyclers to mitigate the issue of storing plastic bottles.
“Think about if a million plastic bottles obtained off the drainage system. Extra importantly, the initiative is addressing the out-of-school kids menace, which has grow to be a critical problem in Nigeria,” he added.
For Musa and lots of dad and mom who couldn’t afford their kids’s tuition in money, a looming shutdown of the varsity would spell doom.
With out Morit, the pupils might add to the alarming variety of out-of-school kids aged 5–14 in Nigeria, estimated at 10.5 million, in line with UNICEF.
“I’m frightened,” Musa declared, wanting downcast.
“See my room,” she stated, gesturing inside her small condo. “I don’t have any home equipment there. No tv, no fan, nothing. The comfort is that my kids are in class.
“Abdulrahman is in Major 4, and his siblings, the twins, are in Major 2. The place will I discover cash to ship them to a different faculty if this one shuts down?”
