Ruby Rabiu and Aliyu M. Hamagam
7 October 2008
Gombe — Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) President Abdul-wahed Ibrahim Omar yesterday warned that Presi-dent Yar'Adua's administration is bound to fail because of its non-challant attitude to education, even as he described the administration's seven point agenda as an illusion that cannot make the country one of the largest economies in the world come 2020 as envisaged.
Omar, who is also the NUT president, spoke during the 2008 World Teachers Day (WTD) that was celebrated at the Eagle Squa-re, Abuja yesterday.
The NLC boss said other developing countries see buil-ding human capacity as a priority, saying the reverse is the case in Nigeria.
"With the poor investment in teachers' welfare and poor fun-ding of education, Nigeria cannot join the 20 largest economies by the year 2020. With the shabby way we treat the Nigerian tea-cher, the Year 2020 Agenda will remain at best a pipe dream, and at worst a pathetic illusion", he said.
He the administration has misplaced priority which is the crux of the entire crisis in the country. "Education should be major item on the agenda".
"In today's world, oil and gas, solid minerals and other brick and mortar elements are no longer the decisive factors in development. The most consequential asset and prerequisite for develop-ment today is human capacity.
"What is the lesson for Nige-ria? The lesson is that proper in-vestment in teachers' welfare is investment in education be-cau-se the teacher is the driver of the knowledge industry. Invest-ment in education is investment in productivity growth; invest-ment in education is investment in development", he said.
In his remarks, President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua assured Nigerian teachers of his admi-nistration's resolve to continue to encourage the provision of in-centives that would impact posit-ively to the welfare of teachers in the country.
President Yar'Adua, who was represented by the Minis-ter of Education, Dr. Igwe Aja-Nwachuku, also said, "the Fede-ral Government will continue to encourage the employers of teachers to provide reasonably competitive remuneration.
"Training and re-training of teachers will continue to obtain priority attention in order to stem the problems of teachers' obso-lescence in a growing world of knowledge. In this regard, the Federal Government will conti-nue to strengthen the capacity of teachers through Continuing Professional Development and expand national training capa-city generally", he said.
Earlier, the NUT Deputy Na-tional President, Comrade Onem Nelson, lamented that though the Governors' Forum agreed to implement TSS, the recent arran-gement fell short of the dream of the Nigerian teachers.
Nelson said the agreement only represented additional allo-wances peculiar to the teaching profession with the bench-mark of 27.5 percent of the existing basic salaries in the 36 states and the FCT.
"The Union, therefore, calls for the commitment of state go-vernments to the speedy and prompt implementation of these allowances as enshrined in the signed agreement. State and FCT governments are, however, expected to go the extra mile and pay percentages higher than the agreed minimum of 27.5 per-cent", he said.
The climax of the celebration was the distribution of 206 Peu-geot cars to hardworking and out-standing teachers. The benefi-ciaries are Mr. Oyewole Adewale from Ekiti State, Alli Adesina (Ogun) and Fubara Augusta (Ri-vers). Others won prizes ranging from 5.5KVA generators, double-deck refrigerators, computers and printers. Nasarawa State came first in the march-past by the tea-chers from the 36 states and the FCT. It was followed by Lagos State while Enugu State came third.
Meanwhile, Gombe State Go-vernor Alhaji Mohammed Dan-juma Goje says plans are under-way to introduce special salary package for teachers in the state while admonishing them to make a sober reflection on the condi-tion of education in the country and look inward for a better way towards improving the sector.
Governor Danjuma Goje, who was represented by his Deputy, John Lia'zarus Yoriyo, said yes-terday during this year's World Teachers' Day in Gombe that it would not be unfair to adduce that education has not been given the desired attention in some parts of the country.
"We must all gear up and show our genuine commitment to the development of education for the benefit of the present and future generations", he said.
He said despite the recent 27.5 percent increase in teachers' salaries the state equally planned a special package for those teaching in the rural areas of the state. He said the state govern-ment had also made an arran-gement to introduce an annual award for best teacher of the year as part of an effort to encourage excellence in the service.
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