Yenagoa — President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday justified the decision of the Federal Government to fund the training of over 557,155 primary school teachers nationwide through the utilisation of the savings from the Debt Relief Gains (DRG), saying it is all in an effort to tackle the shortage of manpower and meet the nation's Millennium Development Goals.

Jonathan, who spoke at the flag-off of the 2010 nationwide capacity building workshops for 140,000 public primary school Teachers, said though various intervention funds, the execution of the National Assembly Constituency projects, the Universal Basic Education and the conditional grant scheme, the government is determined to uplift standards in the education sector.

Jonathan, who was represented by the Minister of Education, Professor Ruquyyatu Ahmed Rufa'i, said the funding and the training of teachers is a demonstration of the Federal Government commitment to improve the education service delivery, "using parts of the savings from debts relief that Nigeria received in 2005 for the implementation of the projects hasten achievements of the MDGs within the globally agreed time frame of 2015."

The president noted that other intervention areas of the Federal Government since 2006 include the provision of infrastructural facilities, furnishing and supply of primary six core text books in public schools across the country, "all these are in pursuant of our national vision of ensuring that the Nigerian Education sector is repositioned for effective global competitiveness in terms of its quality of outputs and its effectiveness in ensuring that Nigeria attains its UBE programme as well as global commitments to the MDGs and EFA within the agreed time frame of 2015"

In his address, the Minister of State for Education, Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi expressed concern over the rising cases of the involvement of Nigerian elites in the enrolment of their wards in institutions abroad rather he said "the Federal Government has tried to correct the issue and it is not a mistake that the investment in education is done."

The Senior Special Assistant to the President on Millennium Development Goal (MDG), Hajia Amina Az-Zubair said the a total of 143,140 Teachers were trained across the nation at inception in 2006, another sets of 158,600 and 115,415 teachers trained in 2008 and 2009 respectively. While the flag off in Yenagoa, would accord an additional set of 140,000 teachers to train across the country.

Hajia Az-Zubair said the training of Teachers is a serious task that demands the total commitment of all stakeholders," if our dream of becoming one of the top twenty global economies in the year 2020 (vision 2020) is to become a reality.