President says reconstruction of Mosteiros school symbolizes idea of global Cape Verdean nation

José Maria Neves presided over the inauguration of the requalification and reconstruction works of the Ribeira do Ilhéu school and highlighted some aspects that he classified as “fundamental pillars” in the construction of a country, among which he highlighted the idea of inclusion.

“If we have the possibility of considering differences and integrating everyone into the global development process, we will be accelerating the pace of development,” said José Maria Neves, who highlighted the “inclusive leadership” of the mayor of Mosteiros, Fábio Vieira, in mobilizing all the people of Mosteiros, residents of the municipality, on the islands and in the diaspora for the development of the municipality.

For the President of the Republic, it is healthy and natural that people do not think the same way or have the same opinions, but within the framework of pluralism and democracy, people must have the ability to mobilize all Cape Verdeans to accelerate the pace and face the challenges that lie ahead.

The head of state congratulated the Mosteiros council for having mobilised the diaspora, which responded positively to the school rehabilitation project, which will be “a reference for Cape Verde”.

He added that with the mobilization of all Cape Verdeans on the islands and in the diaspora, the country will accelerate the pace of its development and face the challenges ahead more successfully.

“In these almost 50 years of our independence, we have already done a lot. We have invested in education and health, we have built new infrastructures and now we have the resources and the foundations to accelerate development,” said José Maria Neves, for whom now is the time to start investing in people’s quality of life and in the quality of infrastructures.

For the President of the Republic, upon arriving at Mosteiros, one realizes that there is “a commitment to quality and excellence”, as well as a permanent search for improving people’s quality of life, and emigrants have given “enormous support” in this regard.

José Maria Neves confessed that sometimes when listening to political speeches from all parties he feels sad because there is a “cold dispute for protagonism” around infrastructures and said that schools, roads, ports, airports and electricity are important to serve the people and observed that the municipalities, Government and the Republic exist to serve the people.

The requalification and reconstruction of the Ribeira do Ilhéu school is the result of a partnership between the council, a Luxembourg NGO, the Ministry of Education and emigrants and, according to the council, everyone joined hands and worked to make this school more modern, with more possibilities to respond to people's desires and wishes.

José Maria Neves also defended the need for dialogue between local and central government, between the State and society, to achieve the common good and satisfy people's desires, aspirations and feelings.

Therefore, he emphasized, there must be mutual respect, institutional loyalty and a framework for dialogue to seek consensual solutions to resolve problems.

According to him, since independence there has been a strong investment in Education and he stressed that if there are areas where the country has made great gains, they were Education, Professional Training and Health because it invested in people.

Neves acknowledged that there are increasing challenges and the need to continue building consensus to accelerate the pace of development.

He stressed that it is important that emigrants continue to invest and believe in Cape Verde and that, in this matter, emigrants from Fogo are setting an example.

“In addition to financial donations, there are also spiritual donations, donations of ideas, mental habits that they learned abroad, in more developed societies, and bring to Cape Verde,” concluded the head of state.

The requalification and reconstruction of the Ribeira do Ilhéu primary school is included in the municipal programme for the requalification of the school park and cost, according to the Mosteiros municipality, 43 thousand contos, financed by the council at 57.8 percent (%) with its own resources and others mobilised from the Luxembourg non-governmental organisation Betebuerg Helleft (24,300 contos).

A group of emigrants from Ribeira do Ilhéu in the USA mobilized the global amount of 14 thousand contos, equivalent to 33.3% of the work and the Ministry of Education contributed 4,700 contos (11.1%).

The new school has four classrooms, a multimedia room, a cafeteria, a teachers' room and a principal's office, a kitchen and four bathrooms.