18/07/2017
*Matters Arising from the attempted poisoning at Lekki British International School*
A lot has been said and discussed about the incident at the Lekki British School. And as expected, when issues like this come up,there are bound to be myriad of perspectives, some of which may not be in the interest of those involved.
Specifically, not many of have examined the implications of this incident on the future of the kids and even their parents. For those who missed out on the initial story this is what happened as reported by the Punch newspapers:
"A Junior Secondary School pupil of the Lekki British International School, Lekki, Lagos, was caught for allegedly putting sulphuric acid and ethanol in the water bottle of his classmate.
PUNCH Metro gathered that the 12-year-old was envious of the 11-year-old female classmate, who had beaten him to the first position in the first and second terms.
The incident happened around 1.30pm on Wednesday, June 14.
The school was planning for the third term exam when the 12-year-old allegedly sneaked into the school’s laboratory and stole the acid and ethanol. He was said to have mixed the chemicals and poured them into the 11-year-old’s water bottle.
Two pupils of the school reportedly caught him in the act and reported to the school management. The suspect allegedly owned up to the crime, saying he had been planning it for sometime.
A member of the 11-year-old’s family said on Wednesday that despite the culprit’s confession, the school allowed him to sit for the third term examination. When our correspondent contacted the school management, an official, who did not identify herself, said the pupil had been expelled.
She said, “The boy has been expelled with immediate effect. The girl is in school and she is fine. We have zero tolerance for such misbehaviour.”
The questions I have been asking since this incident occurred are:
1.What's the most redemptive approach to handling incidents like this especially where the child who committed the crime has confessed to it?
2.What is the implication of expelling a child from school when the child has already confessed to the crime?
3.To whose good is the expulsion? Is it to help the boy, the girl and her family or the school?
4.Are there ways we could have punished the boy and still get him back up again?
5.Granted the act may have led to death. But it didn’t. So, how do we ensure we make the best out of what looks like an ugly situation?
6.If everyone feels the boy involved need psychological help to get back up and rebuild from perhaps an abyss of envy ,would expulsion get him that help?
7.What lessons would he learn from being expelled and stigmatised?
8.How would this boy feel 30,40,50,years from now when he remembers this incident? Would he feel loved and forgiven or bitter, hated, despised and broken?
9.How do we help the girl in question since she could also be traumatized by by now?
10.Is it possible that we could have gotten this girl to the point where the boy apologizes to her and then we have her accept and forgive the boy with both of moving on with their lives? What would that entail?
11.How would it feel ,if we can get this boy to the point where he feels forgiven and reintegrated into the school system knowing that we live in a society where people offend and are punished but helped to get back again into society?
12.The girl needs to know that trying to excel is not a crime for which you risk being harmed by an envious competitor. How do we help her get to this point?
13.The parents of the boy might have a hard job trying get their son back to his normal self...have they been abandoned and left to be on their own and deal with the situation in the best way they could or there is professional help available to them?
14.Who is helping the parents of the girl deal with this incident especially the counseling they need to recover from trauma and be able to forgive and love again?
15.The issues of hate, animosity and inability to forgive that this incident would have birthed in their heart (especially if tribal and religious prejudices are involved) need not be swept under the carpet.
16.It is possible that this incident could have provided an opportunity to have these two families offer apologies and accept FORGIVENESS -reconcile ,love one another and use this incident as a momentum needed to build love and unity among us a nation no matter how hard it might seem?
17. What lessons can we learn from the role of the bystander in all of this? Don’t forget if the two boys who caught the boy in the lab while he was mixing the chemicals did not report,we would not have known that danger was lurking in the corner.
18.Have we been able to make the best of the learning opportunities this incident provides or like it is normal we have bungled it and moved on not minding the implication on the lies of those involved and affected?
19. This boy obviously deserve sympathy and help given that he has serious issues dealing with competition. Do we think he must have received that help by now?
As we ponder on these posers,perhaps it would help to examine this statement from the Australian Law Reform Commission on disciplinary measures for children in education.
*" A child disrupted from school suffers a number of detriments, including disruption to education and a blow to that child's self-esteem. Expulsion is also likely to be felt as a rejection. The language used by students — 'kicked out of school' or 'thrown out' — is an indication that exclusion is seen and felt as a hostile and aggressive act, and many children give up on the education system after being excluded from school."*
If these kids are to be helped to become better citizens, have we as a people done enough to help them become better despite what has happened? We owe it to ourselves as a people to revisits how we punish children knowing that a child has the future ahead and we jeopardize that future in our whatever punitive and correctional measures we choose to apply.
Thank you for your time as I welcome your feedbacks.
