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Nigeria: Ogun State and Its Strides in Education
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Vanguard (Lagos)
COLUMN
15 May 2008
Posted to the web 15 May 2008
Olusegun S. Ali
Lagos
ONE of the cardinal points of the late sage, Chief Obafemi Jeremiah Awolowo during his electioneering campaign was education.
For Chief Awolowo, education, alongside other sectors, remain the saving grace for any country to Otunba Olugbenga Daniel.
flourish. In fact, he ensured that all governors on the platform of the UPN deemed it fit to provide free education for children in the South-west region.
The campaign for the education of the young seems to be gaining momentum as various Non-Governmental Organisations have urged both the Federal and State governments to provide the necessary things needed for life especially for children.
One state executive amongst other, who seems passionate about education, if one is not underscoring the fact, is Otunba Olugbenga Daniel.
His administration has taken it upon itself to ensure that not only is free education provided but also that all existing facilities in the education sector in Ogun State are properly maintained.
It was only recently that the state government instituted a bursary award not just to Ogun State students in Ogun State but all students of Ogun State extraction.
It is instructive to note that in times past, only students in tertiary institutions in the state were privileged to get bursary.
As part of its commitment to education, the state government set up the Gateway Industrial and Petroleum Institute, GIPI. The institute was commissioned some five months ago and this endeavour is in anticipation of the Olokola Gas Project. The institute would serve as a source of skilled manpower to indigenes of the state.
Owing to its passion for education, the state government set aside 15 percent of its total budget to the Olabisi Onabanjo University, which is about N110m; the teaching hospital gets about N80m - these are just recurrent expenditure. Besides, the state government undertakes capital projects from time to time in the university.
And in consonance with the United Nations counsel that education should take at least 25 percent of budgetary allocations, the administration of Gbenga Daniel allocates at least 25 percent of its budgetary spending to education.
At least 40 new secondary schools have been opened since taking over as governor, while four new polytechnics created in addition to the Tai Solarin University of Education.
The university, the first of its kind in Nigeria has also won an NUC award as a best institution in ICT.
Before the inception of the present administration, school principals allegedly charged all manner of fees, but all these have been nipped in the bud since Daniel assumed office.
Some principals and headmasters and headmistresses were shown the way out for collecting fees considered illegal as the government has banned all such fees.
Meanwhile, the Ogun State Government remains the only state in Nigeria to have met the UNESCO recommended standard for education in government's budget having allocated 26 per cent of its 2008 budget to the sector.
The State Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Prof. Segun Awonusi, declared that the state government was heavily subsidizing education in its tertiary institutions, even as he explained that its secondary schools remained tuition free while the children of the state continued to enjoy free education.
Awonusi argued that the clarification became necessary to clear the air on the allegation by the Publicity Secretary of Pan Yoruba socio political organisation, Afenifere, Mr. Yinka Odumakin, that the state was courting "cheap publicity in the name of Chief Obafemi Awolowo" regarding its educational policy.
The commissioner, who noted that the state government deserved praises for its sacrifices in the area of education, said it was unrealistic to demand absolute fee freedom for all the schools in the state.
According to him, "Ours is a policy which clearly meets UNESCO recommended international standard in an age when even the Federal Government, that is awashed with a lot of money, has just moved from eight per cent to 13 per cent in the 2008 budget,".
He argued further that "It is therefore unrealistic to insist on education fees-freedom absolutus unless we want Governor Gbenga Daniel to spend 75 per cent of the state budget on education so that there will be peanut provision for other equally demanding social services like health, environment, housing etc."
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Awonusi debunked the claims of population explosion in the state tertiary institutions, arguing that the state government had invested massively in the recruitment of teachers for the state schools.
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