Kunle Adeyemi had planned to expand the learning center to rekindle hopes in the lives of children living on the waterfront located on the Lagoon heart of the nation’s largest city of Lagos.
As a pilot scheme, the architect also had dreams of diversifying into housing in the coastal region by coming up with alternative building system suitable for urban water culture for teeming population in view of the impact of climate change and rapidly urbanising African context.
Brimming with optimism, he went into partnership with some international and local organisations with a view to achieving his aims.
It is an initiative that would see about 100 children who live on the Makoko Waterfront having the opportunity to learn under the roof of the school. But the success of this venture was short-lived, he started experiencing hiccups when Lagos State Government outlawed the establishment of the school.
Observers are, however, surprised that years after, such initiative did not see the light of the day despite the nation’s high rate of out of school children.
A report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) had hitherto ranked Nigeria high among nations where large populations of school children are not in the classrooms.
The report showed that one out of every five Nigerian children is out of school.
The UNESCO Education for All Global Monitoring Report (EAGMR) affirmed Nigeria holds the world record of having the highest number of its young people out of school.
With approximately 10.5 million kids out of school, Nigeria tops the table of 12 other countries with which it accounts for 47 per cent of the global out-of-school population.
In the report,other countries are Pakistan (5.1 million); Ethiopia (2.4 million); India (2.3 million); Philippines (1.5 million); Cote d’Ivoire (1.2 million); Burkina Faso (1 million); Niger (1 million); Kenya (1 million); Yemen (0.9 million); Mali (0.8 million) and South Africa (0.7 million).
It was well articulated that of all these countries, according to UNESCO, Nigeria is among the four that have experienced the highest increase since 1999.
Though Adeyemi’s dream seemed delayed, those who know his antecedents say he is a no-nonsense person, firm and independent minded that would see to the realisation of his dream.
As a passionate person, Adeyeimi said curiosity drove him into building Makoko Floating School which has generated a lot of discussions and has attracted great universities home and abroad wanting to partner with the project.
On what inspired his involvement in building Makoko school on water, he told LEADERSHIP Sunday he started out by looking into one of the challenges in Lagos State.
He said, “This was at a time that Governor Fashola came into power and I asked what are the challenges of Lagos State? Housing was brought to me as one of them. I said okay, I am going to look at housing solutions and in looking at that, try to investigate housing solutions.
“Like anybody else passing through the Third Mainland Bridge and seeing this community development, it was like a community on water. You are looking for low income housing, why don’t you understand how people at the bottom of the ladder cope with the housing development and living, so that was how I got involved.
“It was purely curiosity that drove me there. I went there and I was shocked and at the same time inspired just at the way the people are living, the conditions, difficulties they are facing at the same time, with very little, they have been able to create so much.”
He noted that Makoko represents maximum urbanisation with minimum needs, saying it was a place for him to learn from them and also see how he can contribute to their development.
According to him, “That is how we started. It is really a relationship, from one person, I was introduced to a community leader and then it became a collaboration of us, the community and they came up with ideas,” he said.
“This is the wood that we are using, this is the timber, we can do that. So, it is really a unique way of creating something, working with people, understand their challenges and proffering solutions collectively, hoping that it is an idea that works.
“It is not a perfect solution, yes! but it’s a starting point for developing what we think could be a breakthrough in addressing many coastal waterfront communities spread all over Lagos, Badagry, Epe, to Ondo, Niger Delta areas and then you think of the coast of Africa.”
He told LEADERSHIP Sunday that they have erected the structure with the cooperation of the people of Makoko, saying,” We still need the state government to give us the go ahead to build the classrooms and other facilities needed for such a mobile classroom, housing.
“Presently, it is being used for recreational activities and other things, as the people are fond of the structure which is also attracting visitors. We hope to complete the project as the children are ready to start coming for the school. So we hope to see great things and opportunities for these people.”
Adeyemi said he is optimistic that the Lagos State Government will rescind on destroying the Makoko waterfront.
He said, “There are many ways of skinning a cat. The project affords the state government to look into ways of tackling the problem of housing in an environment like this. And you know we have so many settlements like this in Lagos flood prone communities and beyond.”
He said NLE, a company he established four years ago is focused on developing cities, noting that sustainable urban growth is at the core of NLE.
According to him, “our architectural, design and urbanism practice is focused on developing communities and cities with a social and environmental consciousness. We are based in Lagos and Amsterdam and have been involved in great projects all over the world.”
As controversy trails the floating school, Lagos State Government said it may demolish the three-storey floating school built on Makoko waterfront, saying the school is illegal.
According to the Commissioner for Waterfront and Infrastructure Development, Prince Adesegun Oniru, the floating school was illegal as it had no approved plan.
“It’s an illegal structure, it shouldn’t be there, and we are trying to get rid of structures there. It’s not a project that has been abandoned, various bodies have gone to court, and we stand to be corrected.
“I cannot say much because there is a legal case on ground. It’s without the knowledge and permit of the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development as well as Ministry of Water Front and Infrastructure.
“It’s been illegal from day one. He waited until there was legal issue in the Makoko area before he started putting the school up. We were not going to do things against the law which would have been seen as contempt of court, so he carried on and brought in CNN to show the illegal floating school.”
He said once things are sorted out they would do what we have to do in the interest of all parties.
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