The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

STUDENTS at AF Adderley have had to be relocated due to some of its facilities being “condemned,” Education Minister Jerome Fitzgerald revealed yesterday.

Mr Fitzgerald said the government had to relocate the school’s 7th grade students due to the school’s trailers, which have been set up as makeshift classrooms, being condemned. He said the government is currently constructing a 24-classroom block costing $10m-$11m. He said the government would likely request bids for this work in four to five weeks.

Until that time, he said the students have been – since before the closure of the last school term – relocated to the Worker’s House building on Tonique Williams-Darling Highway.

Additionally, Mr Fitzgerald said the nine students attending the Rum Cay All Aged School in Rum Cay would be relocated and housed at one of the local churches until the completion of $500,000 worth of renovations.

Both schools, he said, required work that “extends beyond the opening of school”.

Mr Fitzgerald made his statements at a press conference at the EP Roberts Primary School announcing the results of the government’s 2015 Public Schools Repair Programme.

He said the government has spent $7,673,851.92 on the initiative. He also said 300 contracts were awarded throughout the Bahamas for the repairs.

E P Roberts Primary School in New Providence, he said, required the most repairs, which are still ongoing. However, he said he has been advised that repairs should be done in time for the opening of school on September 7.

Mr Fitzgerald said the contractor has assured the government that renovations on the school will be completed by that time.

“It’s just the final touches now,” he said.

He added: “All in all we’ve had a pretty good summer with repairs and we’re very pleased. I can say that generally this is probably now the best the schools have looked since I’ve been minister. There are, of course, some schools that are in a lot better shape than others, but I’m talking generally. As I drove around Saturday to every single school on the island I was quite pleased that the schools are ready and contractors are finishing up their work. And we don’t see any challenges with the contractors completing their work since schools being ready.”