Ebola: Nigerian Students Denied Admission

Fri, Oct 31, 2014
By publisher
6 MIN READ

Education

Nigerian students in the United States of America are being denied admissions into schools in America because of the outbreak of Ebola disease in the country which has been contained since August

By Maureen Chigbo  |  Nov. 10, 2014 @ 01:00 GMT  |

Nigeria has been declared Ebola free by the World Health Organisation, WHO, but the fear of the disease is adversely affecting Nigerians abroad.

Nigerians in diaspora, especially in the United States are being discriminated against despite the fact that there has not been any new incidence of Ebola in the country since August when the last infected persons were discharged. On Monday 20, WHO certified the country free of the disease, which has killed about 5000 persons since it started early this year. But Less than two weeks after two Nigerian students were denied admission in a Texas school because of unfounded Ebola fears, the Milford School District in Connecticut has banned a seven-year old Nigerian-American girl, Ikeoluwa Opayemi from attending class. Her offense was that she travelled to Lagos, with his dad, Steve Opayemi earlier this month.

In this particular instance, the parents of the Nigerian-American girl on return from the trip to Lagos, explained to the school that they would permit a medical screening to confirm the wellness of the girl, but they refused.

Some interest group in the US are not happy with the development. Christian Association of Nigerian-Americans, CANAN, said in a statement made available to the Realnews, that it would not take this escalation of ignorance and racism regarding Ebola and Nigerian-Americans lying low.

“We are appalled that a school headed by otherwise responsible educators can succumb to unsubstantiated medical fears and chose to respond with discrimination and denial of a young girl’s right to education.

CANAN rejects the flimsy excuse of the School District Superintendent, Elizabeth Feser, that she acted to protect the interests of other students and staff of the school. If that excuse was not a rash, erratic and immoral one, it would have been laughable,” the statement which was signed by Laolu Akande, executive director, CANAN said.

According to the CANAN, “What will it take for educated people in the management of Milford School District to understand that Nigeria has been declared an Ebola free country, with no infection in over 50 days now? How can people who are paid on public funds act so carelessly to deny a student class attendance when she has shown no trace of Ebola whatsoever?

Akande noted that in other instances in New York, it was not only Nigerians that are being discrimated against. A Senegalese father has expressed worry that his two sons are being bullied and stigmatised as hailing from Ebola country. Like Nigeria, Senegal has been declared Ebola-free. “It is annoying that school officials in Connecticut and Texas are the ones acting in ignorance and spreading fear. The whole concept of education, western education for that matter, is the eradication of ignorance. Yet, what we have in these cases are educators who are not ashamed to be heralding fear, blindness and darkness.

“Will School District Superintendent Elizabeth Feser also ban every student of the district who travels to Texas or New York, where the Ebola outbreak is much more recent than in Nigeria? If she does not, them how can she be confident she has done the right thing? This is truly outrageous!”, it said.

Quoting President Barack Obama who said earlier today in the White House, that Americans are way better than these shenanigans, CANAN said Milford District educators have taken an untoward decision, they are exhibiting uncouth attitudes and have opted for a shallow policy.

“We commend the action of Opayemi seeking a judicial intervention and we support him. It is our hope that this matter would be urgently reviewed and the Nigerian-American girl promptly returned to school with appropriate apologies.

CANAN stands ready to join this fight locally by mobilising our churches and member-networks in Connecticut if the School District delays in reversing its unwise decision.

It added that “it is truly confounding that academic institutions expected to reflect the finer mettle of truth and the lofty scruples of learning are now acting below the common standards of verity.

Not only are the decisions of both Navarro College and Milford School District meaningless in the effort to deal with what has become a global public health challenge, (which the Ebola virus is indeed posing), but they also run directly contradictory to the facts of the Ebola status in Nigeria.”

Besides, what has become well known in the past couple weeks is that the management and control of the outbreak of Ebola in Nigeria has earned the country praise not only from the US government including directly from the White House, but also from the United Nations. US based and international media have confirmed how well the disease has been brought under effective control in Nigeria. This includes articles published in the New York Times and Washington Post.

A recent Daily Beast report said of such policies that targets Nigerians in this Ebola fear-mongering:

“Nigeria, it seems, is an odd place to enact that policy. The country of 174 million has only registered 20 total cases of Ebola since the index patient in July, a response so strikingly effective that the CDC dispatched a team to the country to study their methods.

Already through the first 21-day incubation period following the initial cases, the country is now just five days away from being officially declared by the World Health Organization as Ebola-free. Much of the response is believed to center around what WHO has declared “world-class epidemiological detective work,” which traced all 20 cases back to one passenger at the Lagos airport—ironically, an American.

Unlike its three most affected neighboring countries, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea, citizens in Nigeria are under no threat of becoming infected with the disease within their borders, or at least no more than the threat we face in our country—and definitely not as much risk as an institution merely minutes away from its own outbreak.”

CANAN, like all other groups and people of goodwill here in America are concerned about the outbreak of Ebola in America and will continue to support the federal, state and local authorities in this country in implementing common sense public health interventions to deal with the situation.

However, it said, denying young students like a seven-year old girl her educational rights is a disingenuous approach and the purveyors of such an approach should be ashamed of themselves, especially being a school.

“It is sad that some uneducated educational leaders in Connecticut and Texas are now promoting bigoted and racist responses to what is truly a global challenge.

As these are public institutions sustained by the taxes of the people, we ask the respective public officials including the local and state governments to put a stop to this acts of racism and unwarranted discrimination NOW!

CANAN also serves notice to our communities and all people of goodwill to stand ready to condemn these errant and erratic decisions,” Akande said.

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