Recently, the executive secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Dr Dikko Suleiman, raised the alarm that about N53 billion of federal government’s intervention fund for basic education was lying untouched in UBEC’s accounts. He attributed this to the reluctance of the affected state governments to provide the requisite counterpart funding to access the money. He further said that lack of political will and commitment by some state governments was responsible for the perceived falling standard in the level of education.
This revelation by UBEC boss should give every Nigerian who cares about the future of this nation a reason to worry, especially as it is coming on the heels of the release of the 2014 May/June West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), where mass failure was recorded mostly in the core subjects, English Language and Mathematics. Basic education is under the purview of state governments in Nigeria. State governments have at various times attributed the low standard at that level to lack of adequate funds to support it. What they have failed to tell the people they govern is that there are funds to be accessed which they have, for reasons best known to them, refused to access over the years.
We do not understand the unwillingness of the state governments to access these funds. N53 billion may not be all that is required but it is a whole lot and can go a long way in addressing the rot in basic education. Such funds can be deployed in the provision of infrastructure, books and even teacher training. It is not news that, in many schools in the country, pupils learn under trees and other demeaning conditions; library shelves are filled with dust, cobwebs and droppings of rodents instead of books; and teachers are of very poor quality – a situation the UBEC boss also blamed for the mass failure recorded in public examinations. He said that teachers engaged in primary and secondary schools across the country are mostly unqualified.
We are deeply worried by the action of the state governments. Nigeria is sitting on an education time-bomb. They should wake up and smell the coffee in case they haven’t. If we do not get our basic education right as a nation, a bleak future awaits us. A nation’s young people are said to be its future leaders but what manner of future leaders are we grooming if they cannot get quality basic education which should prepare them for it?
It is imperative that all state governments who are yet to provide counterpart funding to access the UBE intervention fund should do so without further delay and the money should be deployed for the purpose it is meant. Basic education is the business of state governments and they must handle it with the utmost seriousness and commitment it deserves.
