Onwuka Nzeshi
1 July 2008
Lagos — The three-day retreat was organised for stakeholders in the sub-sector to deliberate on various challenges confronting the Universal Basic Education (UBE) programme. Issues that were listed for discussion included the non-enforcement of the enabling law, funding mode and mismanagement of the funds released to the states, among others. But as it turned out, the controversial Teachers Salary Structure (TSS), for which members of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) are now on strike, dominated the stage.
Since the UBE was launched by former President Olusegun Obasanjo on September 29 1999, it has constantly remained in the news, often times for the wrong reasons. If it was not being castigated by skeptics who saw it as a clone of the defunct Universal Primary Education (UPE) programme launched by the same Obasanjo in 1976, it was being lampooned by those who saw it as another avenue by a not-too-trusted government to divert huge funds to its political favourites in the states under the guise of intervening in the education sector.
These perceptions were made worse by the frequent change of guards at the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) and at the various State Universal Basic Education Boards (SUBEBs) over allegations of mismanagement of the funds accruing to the scheme at both levels.The retreat was therefore an ample opportunity to reach out to key stakeholders in the basic education sector and make them understand the workings, challenges and future of the programme.
Executive Secretary of UBEC, Dr. Ahmed Modibbo Mohammed, set the tone for the discussion with a historical review of the programme and asserted that significant progress has been recorded in enrolment, provision of infrastructural facilities and instructional materials, recruitment and training of teachers, and development of a new nine-year Basic Education Curriculum.
Despite this seemingly impressive performance in the implementation of the programme, he said, there were numerous challenges confronting the scheme, adding that these obstacles required urgent attention if Nigeria must join the league of nations on the path of achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
These challenges, he said, included the granting of access to over nine million out-of-school children, improving mechanism for the draw down on Federal Government FGN-UBE Intervention Funds, accountability and transparency in the utilization of FGN-UBE Intervention Funds and the need for increased and sustained budgetary allocation by State Governments to the UBE programme. He said the retreat would proffer solutions to these and other challenges.
According to him, there were over 10 million children within school age who are not in school, while thousand others with special needs were still left uncatered for in the country. To ameliorate the situation, he advocated the integration of qur'anic education into the UBE programme, a reduction of the 9.3 per cent drop out rate in primary schools; increased transition rate to junior secondary school and improvement of quality and quantity of teachers who are the drivers of the programme.
Available statistics indicate that Nigeria has about 590,655 teachers nuturing about 24.77million children in primary schools across the country. Mohammed said through the UBE Commission, the Federal Government has provided significant opportunities and interventions and established a modest framework for the delivery of quality basic education in the country.
He however observed that the feedback from states and Local Government Education Authorities and other stakeholders indicated a growing gap between UBE set targets and global expectations regarding the attainment of Education for All (EFA) and Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). He advocated an alternative strategy to driving the programme if the country is to meet the access, quality and equity requirements for EFA and MDGs which are fundamental to the attainment of Vision 2020. Also, he said as at June 20,2008 the scheme had disbursed a total of N33.3 billion to all states from the unconditional grants for 2005 and 2006 fiscal years while plans are on for the disbursement of the 2007 unconditional grants. He however observed that many states were yet to access their funds due to their inability to provide their matching grants.
Minister of State II for Education and Chairperson of the programme, Hajiya Aishatu Jibril Dukku reminded participants of the central role of education in the achievement of President Umar Yar'Adua's Seven-Point Agenda. According to her, the vision to accelerate economic growth and social change, create a stable polity and improve on the quality of life of Nigerian citizens would remain a mirage unless Nigeria took seriously, the issue of uplifting the standard of education in the country.
She pointed out that for education to successfully drive the national development process, there is an urgent need to address some of the challenges in the sub-sector which she said, included insufficient and inequitable access, low learning achievement of students, lack of accountability and transparency in the use of funds allocated to education, acute shortage of qualified teachers, infrastructural decay and shortage, poorly motivated, ill-equipped and unskilled teaching force and insufficient instructional materials. She drew the attention of participants to five critical areas that should be addressed with a view to making concrete suggestions. These areas include the primacy of educational planning, provision of equitable and inclusive education directed at bringing into the school the over nine million out-of-school children, improvement of teacher quality and welfare, additional funding sources for UBE and the need for attitudinal change on the part of the public that will engender support for and commitment to the UBE programme.
Participants agreed that there was the need to address the peculiar problems in the states which constituted obstacles to the smooth implementation of the programme; the encumbrances that impede the accessing and utilization of the Federal Intervention Funds by States, especially as these relate to the UBEC guideline and the need for reliable and accurate data for effective planning in the education sector generally and the UBE programme in particular;
Other highlights included meeting the challenge of bringing out-of-school children and other marginalised groups within the fold of formal education; improved working relationship among the various agencies responsible for the implementation of UBE as well as the need to improve teacher supply, teacher quality and welfare as a means of achieving better delivery of quality education. In this light, the conference urged the states to employ the first batch of the participants in the Federal Teachers Scheme (FTS) who will be completing their service at the end of October 2008.
In specific terms, the retreat, among other resolutions recommended that the UBEC Law should be reviewed to remove the encumbrances that currently impede the smooth implementation of the programme; State Governments should increase their level of funding to the UBE programme outside the Matching Grant provided by the UBE Law while there should be some flexibility in the utilization of intervention funds on the basis of needs and peculiarities of States.
It also agreed that there should be provision of funds for monitoring UBE projects from the matching grants component of the Intervention funds and states should set aside adequate funds for the supervision of teaching and learning in the schools; while the 5 percent Home Grown School Feeding and Health Programme Fund be applied to address the problem of special need education, the provision of instructional materials and other programmes as the need arises.
Perhaps one of the issues that generated so much debate and passion was the issue of teachers welfare. National President, Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), Comrade Onem Nelson Onem in his brief remark, described the situation of teachers in the country as one of neglect and abandonment. He did not mince words on the demand of his union to have the Teachers Salary Structure implemented. Onem said the demand by the union was long overdue and declared that primary and secondary teachers would have no other option if by the expiration of their ultimatum, the Federal Government failed to release the official circular meant to bring the TSS into operation.
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