Former Governor of Anambra State, Mr. Peter Obi, has lauded the great contributions of Nigerian teachers towards the country’s development and charged governments at all levels to take them serious by doing more to appreciate them.

“I wish to use the opportunity offered by this year’s World Teachers Day to express my personal gratitude to teachers, especially to Nigerian teachers. All over the world, everybody knows that education is the best investment anybody can make, but that would not be possible without teachers because all of us were taught by teachers.

“I salute the commitment and doggedness of Nigerian teachers, who have continued to achieve significant results despite working in a very challenging environment. I want to let them know that their services to humanity are appreciated,” Obi said in a statement issued on Friday by his Media Office to mark the 2018 World Teachers Day.

The former governor, who since leaving office in 2014 has devoted much of his time and resources towards the promotion of education, appealed to governments at all levels to prioritise the welfare of teachers, “because the country will pay a heavy price if it continues to ignore the strategic role of teachers in the development process.”

He lamented a situation where teachers are poorly paid and made to work for months without pay, declaring that “this is not good enough and must stop if we are serious about the future of our children and the country at large.”

The former governor also tasked government to make the working environment conducive for teachers by providing them with the needed work tools and improving on classroom conditions. “This,” he said, “is the least we can do to appreciate these wonderful but neglected professionals without whom there would be no other professions.”

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