Ejiofor Alike
An oil service company focused on providing diverse services to the upstream sector of the oil and gas industry, Marine Platforms Limited has donated 100 mini libraries to schools in Kaduna State as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) project.
Speaking to journalists on the project at the weekend, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the company, Mr. Baji Nyam said the gesture was to ameliorate the sufferings of the children in the northern part of the country in acquiring education from public schools, stressing that the books will improve the reading culture of the pupils.
He said the company had identified the north as lacking in basic education and decided to intervene because “if you educate a child, the impact is great.”
According to him, the company had approached Lola Shoneyin’s Foundation as a consultant on how to improve the quality of education in the north and she advised the company to work towards improving the reading culture in the area.
“We donated 100 mini libraries among the primary schools in Kaduna State. The pledge was made in November 2015. We worked hard to deliver on our promise but there was a delay in delivering because of logistic challenges and the problem of accessing foreign exchange. But we worked with the Kaduna State Government to identify the kind of books and Lola went round the world to source for the books,” he explained.
According to him, the company spent £29,700 and N13,824,050 on the project, which was completed recently with a presentation at the Sheikh Abubakar Gumi School in Tudun Wada.
“We all should revamp the quality of education in Nigeria. The quality of education we got in public schools in those days is no longer available,” he added.
According to him, there are inherent dangers if the privately educated children continue to receive top quality education at the expense of public educated children, adding also that the development would continue to widen economic gaps.
Apart from Kaduna, which has benefited in the area of education from his company, Nyam said the two communities that surrounded Onne Port in Rivers had also benefitted from the company in several other ways.
“Marine Platforms operates in deep water. Most of our services are run out of Onne and Lagos Ports. We have done CSR for the two communities that surround Onne Port. We donated 50 life jackets for one of the communities. We are providing training to 25 cadets from the Maritime Academy in Oron to have life experience in our vessels. The fleet in Marine Platforms is not old vessels. We provide subsea engineering services. Human divers end in 200 metres of water but we use Remotely-operated vehicles (ROVs) to work in 3 kilometres of water depth,” he explained.
Nyam further stated that as part of the company’s efforts to build local capacity and capability, it had acquired Simulator in 2015 for training personnel locally.
According to him, training one Simulator outside the country cost about spent £40,000.
With services ranging from subsea solutions, well services and vessel chartering, Marine Platforms adheres to the highest standards of professionalism in the oil and gas industry.
