Books’ distribution: FG to sanction defaulting publishers

The Ministry of Education has begun process of sanctioning publishers contracted to supply textbooks and library resource materials to primary and junior secondary schools across the country.

The Minister of State for Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, said this in Abuja on Friday while addressing the publishers in his office.

Wike said  the sanction was as a result of their inability to supply textbooks for the 2012/2013 academic session within the approved six weeks specified in their contract agreements with the Federal Government.

He directed the management of the Universal Basic Education Commission, through its legal department, to write to the publishers.

He said the legal department should indicate the relevant clauses in the agreement upon which they defaulted and the specified sanctions.

The minister described the default of all the publishers as regrettable.

He said the ministry had already written to the president for the nationwide distribution scheduled for launch on November 30.

“The publishers cannot hold the government to ransom. You have been doing this but it cannot continue. We will apply the necessary sanctions,’’ the News Agency of Nigeria quoted the minister as saying to the publishers.

Wike pointed out that after six weeks, the publishers ought to have supplied books to the 36 states and Abuja.

“The publishers claimed that they had the capacity to deliver within schedule. I am really disappointed and I will not hesitate to recommend to the president that you don’t have the capacity,’’ he said.

Responding on behalf of the publishers, the Managing Director of Heinemann Educational Books, Nigeria, Mr. Ngwuocha Okereke, appealed to the minister to temper justice with mercy.

Okereke gave the assurance that the publishers would work round the clock to deliver all the textbooks and resource materials to the states before the launch.