The government stated this amid the increase in the number of virus infection, as its battled the second wave of the pandemic.

The National Coordinator of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, Dr Sani Aliyu, who disclosed this while during his on TVC on Tuesday, noted the taskforce is yet to take a decision on imposing a fresh lockdown in the country.

“The behaviour of the public when it comes to these rules matters. We have countries abroad that have very strict non-pharmaceutical intervention measures and everybody follows it.

“The flights are coming in, schools are open, churches are open, and they don’t have COVID-19 problems because everybody observes the rules.

“We definitely don’t want a lockdown and because we don’t want to lock down, we need to make sure we do everything we can to prevent ourselves from reaching that state where the government will have to take action,” he said.

The Federal Government ordered a lockdown in March 2020 in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja, Lagos and Ogun States for over five weeks during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It led to job losses as airlines, hotels, banks, among others cut their workforce due to the crushing economic effect of the lockdown

National Coordinator, Presidential Task Force on COVID-19, Dr Sani Aliyu,  gave the order on Monday at the COVID-19 briefing in Abuja.

Dr Aliyu, while speaking on school reopening, said that PTF would like to re-emphasise adherence to non-pharmaceutical interventions by schools, particularly screening and heightening awareness with regards to COVID-19, following issues it had with Lagos State over outbreaks in some schools.

“Any student presenting with symptoms consistent with COVID-19, particularly respiratory symptoms or fever, should not be allowed to come to school.

According to him: “When teachers notice a child with respiratory symptoms, the child should be sent back home so that we can reduce the risk of transmission.

“Just as it is important to communicate effectively with parents, staff, school health teams should be creating protocols and providing regular updates on any change to the school procedures as it relates to COVID.

“We encourage schools to continue to consider creative solutions to abide by our COVID guidelines including staggered learning to avoid overcrowding, platooning, daily attendance and adjusting teachings among others.”

PTF Coordinator, Dr Sani Aliyu who made the announcement on Monday, September 21 said the disbursement is to drive up the states’ COVID responses.

Aliyu said “We have released money to the state governments recently, to 32 state governments. Each state government was given a billion naira. This is for the purpose of driving their COVID responses and we are asking them to prioritise testing in addition to surveillance activities linked to COVID-19”

The National Coordinator of the task force, Dr Sani Aliyu, disclosed this on Tuesday, in response to the joint Senate committees on Health and Aviation on the testing procedures, following the reopening of the international airspace.

According to him, in one instance, up to 40 per cent of passengers in a single flight tested positive for COVID-19 despite having tested negative before boarding from their respective countries.

Consequently, Aliya said an adjustment has been made to the validity period of PCR tests to be presented before boarding from seven to four days.

On its part, the Senate said it is worried about the low number of laboratories in the country. They, however, promised that the request for 52 labs will be made in the 2021 budget.

It, however, advised that the reopening should be done in phases or staged so as to avoid another outbreak of COVID-19 especially on vulnerable groups who are returning back to schools.

It could be recalled that the Federal Government in March shut down schools across the country, as part of measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

However, with the number in cases declining, the Federal Government on August 4, 2020 announced the resumption of SS3 and JSS 3, so as to write this year’s West African Senior School Certificate Examination, which was slated for August 17, 2020, through September 12, 2020.

But speaking on Thursday during a briefing at the Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport, Abuja, the National Coordinator of the Presidential Taskforce on COVID-19, Dr Sani Aliyu said the task force recommends phased return of students.

Aliyu said, “For educational institutions which include daycare, primary, secondary and tertiary institutions. Educational institutions should begin the process of working towards potentially reopening within this phase.

“However, strongly recommend that states conduct risk assessment to ensure all schools are at a level of compliance and create a monitoring mechanism to assess and create and monitor this level of preparedness.

“Meanwhile, all daycares and educational institutions to remain closed to in-classes until this level of risk is assessed. And if there will be opening of schools, it must be staged and preferably carried out in phases to ensure that this does not pose a risk to the general public and in particular to vulnerable groups that might end up getting infected by students going back home.”

Recall that the government, following the lifting of the lockdown occasioned by the COVID-19  pandemic, had on May 4, 2020, imposed a nationwide curfew from 6pm to 8am. It later reviewed the timing to between 10pm and 4am on June 1, 2020.

This was disclosed by the National Coordinator of the Presidential Taskforce on COVID-19, Dr Sani Aliyu during a briefing at the Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport, Abuja, on Thursday.

Aliyu said the modification of the nationwide curfew takes effect from today (September 3) midnight.

He, further stated that the curfew does not apply to essential workers and international travellers.

“I will first of all start with general movement. We are modifying the curfew to commence from 12 midnight to 4am nationwide, effective from 12:00 tonight.

“This does not apply to people on essential services and international travellers that might be returning from abroad,” he said.

This announcement was made during the National Coordinator of the Presidential Taskforce on COVID-19, Dr Sani Aliyu, during a briefing at the Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport, Abuja, on Thursday.

“For the National Youth Service Corp, the NYSC is to consolidate on safety measures currently being put in place and start preparing for the reopening of orientation camps when educational institutions open.

“We are in the process of developing strict guidelines to ensure there is no outbreak of Covid-19 when this process starts,” Aliyu said.

This was disclosed by the National Coordinator of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19, Dr. Sani Aliyu at the taskforce briefing in Abuja on Thursday.

Non-contact sports, according to the Coordinator include athletics, lawn tennis, table tennis, golf, cricket, cycling, among others.

However, contact sports like football, boxing, wrestling, Taekwondo,  rugby, swimming and basketball remain banned until further notice.

“For recreational parks/communal sports, restrictions are removed on outdoor communal non-contact sports and the use of recreational parks for supervised physical exercise, not for social interactions.

For recreational parks that are unable to enforce this, we expected them to remain closed.

“For outdoor non-contact sports, this includes lawn tennis, table tennis, squash, badminton, cycling, athletics, golf, polo, para-athletics, cricket, and other non-contact outdoor communal activities, in the event that people are not certain, please contact the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports for further guidance,” he said.

The National Coordinator, Presidential Task Force on COVID-19, Sani Aliyu, made this know during the daily briefing of the task force in Abuja on Monday.

Aliyu said that the curfew will remain in force between 10pm and 4am.

Speaking about restriction of movements in high burden local government areas, he noted that the government has given approval, adding that 18 local government areas account for 60% of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Nigeria.

Aliyu said this while speaking at the presidential task force on COVID19 today June 22.

He said “Nigerians have continued to show persistent and remarkable lack of compliance to COVID19 prevention protocols which is quite worrying. In the cities where the adherence to these protocols was high in the initial two weeks of the ease lockdown, progressively over time, citizens are letting down their guards and this remains of great concern. There is partial to total non-compliance to face mask and physical distancing protocols by the public. Many Nigerians only use their facemask either to avoid security agents or where they are told to do so. There is also significant disbelief in the danger and impact of COVID19. In parts of the South East where we did a survey, 60% did not believe that COVID was an issue at all. We clearly are not taking the pandemic seriously enough”.