EDUCATION AS PROOF OF ENLIGHTENMENT, MODERNISM AND PROSPERITY: WHY IT IS SO IMPORTANT IN NIGERIA
By Orefo Nnamdi Onochie
Recent events have revealed how parents in Nigeria show that unless every child is well educated, in the next ten-twenty years, our capacity to modernise, develop and prosper, will still remain stalled. The obligatory responsibility to raise a child in a traditional setting rests on the family and community; and in the modern State, on the Constitution and Government. The calculus of the productive capacity of each is personalized at an income level.
Thus the formative inculcative educational level achieved by each individual determines their earning capacity, though it may not necessarily be based on formal education alone; apprenticeships in the various professions, trades and crafts, have been used as basis of determining the educational and income capacity of many Nigerian communities and populations.
For example, much as the scholastic aptitude or level, of one trained in a science institute up to diploma level, wil place that individual on a high salary scale, the apprenticeship training of another in machinery, and welding craft, plumbing or furniture-making, trading on articles of daily use or need, hairdressing, will over a considerable period of time, lead to incomes and status of considerable standing, such that the levels of prosperity or quality of life of such individuals, under assessment, would have proven to be analogous. The one who got certified as a hairdresser, with working experience of 7-years, would be earning an approximate monthly income as another who earned a diploma in building engineering from an academic institute with same 7-year experience. Thus, both would have been beneficiaries of the standard education they have earned.
The Universal Basic Education Act of 2004, UBE, which is the highest and last policy Law in Nigeria on education, anticipates and ensures that humble, best quality education is free and compulsory for children and young people, from kindergarten to Junior Secondary 3.
Subsequently, after these lower primary and early secondary levels, the unnecessary fees and administrative instability take over. This is in formal education, and the restrictions and constrictions expand in technical, crafts, trades and other education sectors, which stabilize and provide job opportunities to young people.
EXPOSURE AND ENLIGHTENMENT
The 2004 Nigerian National Policy on Education has specific identified goals which must be achieved in the sector, and these include academic subject knowledge, personal moral accountability and public-work exposure. Thus, for even the very young, all aspects of formal or informal education must impart information that the individual must develop with, as basis for capacity to work; the schooled person must hold himself accountable, to self and others, including the larger society; lastly the general education goal seeks to diligently expose the individual to very high enlightenment and work. It is not simply that our educational goals, anticipates and situates every Nigerian to be prepared for active productive, accountable and prosperous life, it spells and obligates more. With less than 31% of our national population of more than 250 million people being educated above Senior Secondary 3, how well has the national education policy, based on the 2004 compulsory UBE Act,succeeded?
FREE COMPULSORY EDUCATION OF UBE
On paper, the UBE, the compulsory Universal Basic Education Act of 2004, appears to be a panacea of superior grade. But having now been practiced in Nigeria for about 18 years, the impact has been unimpressive. Rather than evince consistent rise in the numbers of child/student enrollment, as well as the moderately educated persons, the numbers have remained uninspiring and low. In certain States, zones and regions, the numbers of out-of-school children have risen dramatically, especially in the rural areas in the North and South. But it is more remarkable in the North, for varying reasons, these being religious and cultural factors. There have been assertions that Islam does not encourage western education, which is generally true (acknowledged and negated by the maxim of Boko Haram, that Western scholarly education is forbidden): also certain ethnic groups in Nigeria are said to discourage female education. Again an assertion that the registration of children of school age in the North is at a very low percentage of 54% per capita in the major population centers. These type of data belie the situation in other comparable Islamic societies such as Egypt, Indonesia, Libya,United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Tunisia, and even Saudi Arabia. There is a local domestic attribute and factor that is Nigerian which makes enrollment in primary lower education institutions in Nigeria to fail. It stems from the crassness and ambiguity of the ruling elite, who have used culture and religion to subjugate the populations of parts of the North: the lowest rung in the society have remained Talakawas (meaning, the down-trodden). This is the bane in Nigeria. How will it be cured, and what is the place of UBE in this matrix?
HOW UBE HAS FAILED IN NIGERIA
In most countries where free universal compulsory basic education (or even up to higher levels), have been Government policy for more than 40 years, enrollment elevation of young persons have been remarkable. Many examples abound, such as Norway, India, Libya, Isreal, Indonesia etc the policy that compels every child to attend school easily, with the parents or guardians at risk of being imprisoned if the child is not in school. These are also obtainable in many other societies, including massively populated India and China. In Nigeria, the opposite is the case. More than 18 years of adoption as Law in Nigeria, UBE is yet to evince remarkable impact on enrollment of primary and junior secondary education. The expected surge in the numbers of young people seeking for admission into tertiary institutions is not being seen: in the South, it is more discernible than it is in the North. The factors responsible for this continuing drag and disparity in both regions can be redressed in the short-term, but this fact is the ultimate truth that the UBE has failed since its inception. If it has succeeded in a highly and much more populous and ethnically diverse country such as India, why not in Nigeria?
FUNDING EDUCATION IN NIGERIA
The parallels of what obtains in our comparative countries are far and in between, yet discernible. The 2022 Federal Education Budget in Nigeria is about N924 Billion. It includes free funding of UBE, and the population of enrollees in that sector is about a quarter of the total number of students in higher Secondary and the tertiary institutions. The corollary in the failure so far of UBE is that the forecast number of literate Nigerians is still very low, compared to the budgetary expenditures on education in Nigeria, in relation with other entities with similar attributes. Whilst the literacy rate in Nigeria has remained low without much improvement since UBE was commenced 18 years ago, comparative analysis with India and Libya (before the ouster of Gaddafi), shows a huge disparity. Literacy rate in Libya and even India, 15 years after the inception of compulsory universal free education, doubled. While in Nigeria our national literacy rate hovers around 31 per cent; in India and Libya the rates of the analogous periods were more than 60 per cent, inspite of differences in total population figures. This disparity is the result of the overall expenditure patterns in education. Why is it important to use literacy rate in determining the extent of Nigeria’s educational development, or that of any other political entity? The quality of life, average incomes and prosperity of all segments of the population is inversely proportionate to their levels of education. The higher the total numbers in literacy rate,the higher will be the quality of life, incomes and prosperity of the general population, and vice ver sa.
COMPULSORY AND COMPREHENSIVE FREE EDUCATION IN NIGERIA
During the penultimate 8-months of total stoppage of public University education, in Nigeria, which began in February 2022, it was adjudged that the total number of students in the tertiary sector was about 2.1 million. This figure does not include students in senior Secondary, Polytechnics, and private universities. In order to aggregate the funding for comprehensive compulsory FREE education in Nigeria, these figures must be included. To deduce the relative link between higher national literacy rate, the levels of higher national development, prosperity of individuals and elevated quality or longevity of life, become germane: not linking literacy levels of UBE in Nigeria, with literacy levels in tertiary and other levels above UBE, easily misses the greater advantage of establishing the congruence of these attributes. Herein lies the compelling reason and rationale in extending to all Nigerian citizens, FREE COMPREHENSIVE COMPULSORY education Policy. The expected total national cost of the policy will average N1.9 – N2.3 Trillion. It is slightly above 10% of the expected Federal budget of 2023, which will be below N17 Trillion. The UNESCO, United Nations Education Cultural and Scientific Organization budgetary benchmark for the Nigerian government in 2022, is 20%, but the allocation is only 7% of the total 2022 annual budget expenditures, which has been dedicated to education; it is too paltry to be dedicated to the education sector. In meeting and surpassing the moral UNESCO threshold in Nigeria, can justificatory rationalizations be adduced to permit the policy? Yes, and it is based on the following:
a. In the past 50 years, the total percentage of the national budget expended on Education in Nigeria has hovered between 3.7% – 4.8%, which stunted educational development, literacy levels and overall prosperity.
b. the decay in infrastructures, quality of curricula and research has been a direct result of the very low and poor funding of the education sector.
c. for more than 40 years, the calendars of tertiary institutions in Nigeria have been at the mercy of strike actions, work-to-rule, disruptions and stoppages of ASUU, the unions of teachers and administrators; and students spend additional 2-3 years before graduation from public universities and institutions.
d. collateral cost to Nigeria due to these avoidable maladies, far out weigh the actual cost of FREE COMPREHENSIVE AND COMPULSORY EDUCATION for all Nigerians, from kindergarten to University level.
e. persistent budgetary educational expenditures in the region recommended above, will lift national industrial, scientific and economic development and prosperity to current G-20 levels
f. courageous and far sighted Presidential leadership from 2023 can traject and catapult Nigeria to much higher literacy levels, in the coming 40-50 years: see where India, and certainly Gaddafi’s Libya (minus the terroristic policies), and surely China, have been situated as a result of the comprehensive FREE EDUCATION policies they have pursued in the past 50 or so years. India is Nigeria’s model educational entity; FREE EDUCATION, science and IT based programs.
CAN NIGERIA AFFORD FREE EDUCATION NOW?
Ploughing through the 2023 Federal Budget, far sighted and dogged tenacity, can be the courageous basis for off-loading a lot of the pork-barrel expenditures, in politics and governance costs. An urgent return to the NIGERIAN PARLIAMENTARY CONSTITUTION OF 1963, will save Nigeria more than N1.8Trillion, from the executive Presidential type politics, corruption of Presidential and Gubernatorial Aspirants, and political parties, where buying delegates and votes with money, is accepted by the current governments, without the criminal prosecution of offenders identified in the public Media; these further fuel ethnic, religious-Islamic based strife. This URGENT RESTRUCTURING will earn a return to focus on national development and prosperity, engineered from the uniting States and local governments. It will also cement Nigeria’s unity, indivisibility and cohesion, based on the glory of our diverse attributes of multiple ethnic nations, religions, humanism, and African culture. The time is now, the 2023 General Elections has and will hasten the process.
Dr. Orefo Nnamdi Onochie
Ebube Dike Ji Ofor Ahaba & Nigeria.
Former 2023 PDP-PRP Presidential Aspirant.
Founder-Convener: Onochie Political Action Conference (ONOPAC)
