Former senator representing Abia South Senatorial district in the ninth National Assembly, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe has called for renewed reading culture and discipline of children to avoid the consequences of lack of knowledge and indiscipline.
Senator Abaribe made this appeal in Abuja during the launch of five books written by Dr. Titilayo Kayode-Alabi in commemoration with this year’s Children’s Day celebration.
He said; “I don’t think it is just for the child, it is also our responsibility to make sure that books of this nature get to the child and the child reads.
“What is happening is that parents do not have time for their children, parents tend to have the teacher take responsibility for the child, not knowing that every parent has a responsibly to the child, we are encouraging every parent to do what is going on here today, give the children what will excite them, what will shape their thinking.
“It is us, parents, that the children emulate, if you do something bad and think the children don’t know, they know, if you set the right footstep the child will take the footstep.
“If the child is going wrong and you correct him, the child will know that doing right or wrong. And parents should not pamper their children, you must correct the child properly.
“There is even a phrase in the Bible that say should not spare the rod for the child, because if you do so, you are going to reap the consequences later, the country will reap the consequences of a bad upbringing of a child, so what Dr Titi has done here is very wonderful, five books for children leading to moral regeneration within our children is wonderful, so we congratulate her.”
Dr Titilayo Kayode-Alabi said she wrote the five books ‘Father’s Tiny Little Brother‘, ‘Skunny’s Perfect Holiday‘, We Do Not Like The New Ugly Ducks! Do we?’ ‘Aduke The Pregnant Girl‘, ‘Somtochukwu And Dawn, The Medi-Fairy’ because she loves to read and as well push African heritage and culture to children for moral regeneration.
“As a child, I loved to read a lot, I saw a lot written by the Westerners and it gave me that impression of Western culture compared to the African, growing I saw content created on witchcraft to even LGBQ and I thought that it is high time we began to create our content, to show our children our own story, our own culture, our heritage.
“As a medical doctor, I see a lot of children and I noticed that when you tell them what they need to know, they are able to make something in their head, in their decision, in their choices that impact the outcome of their health, I said I work in Nyanya hospital, I have limited contact with children, why not broaden my reach? If I started to write and tell medical stories in a way that empowers them to make decisions concerning health.
“I reach more children with my books, besides just writing and inviting people and the media to promote, the other is, I’m contact hoping these books can get ministry of education so that they can bring these into curriculum so that children more in number will read them.”
