The Universal Basic Education
Commission, UBEC, was established to implement and monitor the federel
government basic education programme.. To facilitate the programmes in
the states UBEC boards were established in each state in Nigeria.
The law requires that intervention funds are sent directly to the SUBEBs
to implement projects in primary and secondary schools.Recently the
minister of state for education Nyesom Wike had cause to doubt the
commitment of some SUBEBs to faithfully implement the pragramme in their
states. DAVID AUDU reports on the minister’s frustration.
THE Minister of State for Education,
Nyesom Wike has accused State Universal Basic Education Board Chairmen
for the slow rate of implementation of the federal government Basic
Education programme across the country.
Wike who lamented that
while the federal government is committed to improving standards of
basic education, state SUBEBS that are responsible for the
implementation of the programme are frustrating it by refusing to use
the funds released to them for the intended purpose, and sometime
witholding the fund from the knowledge of their state authorities and
governors.
Wike said every year the federal government disburses
nothing less than five billion naira to each of the 36 states,
including, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, for improving
infrastructure, training and re-training of teachers at this level of
education.
He said though education at this level is mainly the
responsibility of the states and local government, the federal
government in its desires to make quality education available and
accessible to every Nigerian child is providing this intervention fund,
but lamented that SUBEB is sabotaging the efforts.
It is either
the money given to them are not released on time to execute projects or
are not released at all, and the same people go to their state
government to beg for fund to execute basic education projects.
I
have also discovered that when the federal government releases these
intervention funds to chairmen of SUBEBs they will not deem it
appropriate to inform the Commissioners of Education onward to the
governors. In most states the governors are even not aware that the
federal government is giving them money.
Wike who spoke on a
television programme recently said that by law the federal government is
not allowed to give the money directly to the state government, and
therefore stressed that until the law establishing SUBEB is amended, UBE
programme may not achieve its desire results.
Hear him: "I can
tell you that F G spends not less than five billion naira every year in
the training and re-training of teachers. I can also give you an example
of a state. I have told you that this job does not require you to sit
in your office, you must go out and see things for yourself.
"You
can't believe what happened 'recently' and the governor of Akwa Ibom
was shocked. When I paid him a curtesy call, I said in this year we have
released fund for the training and re-training of your teachers, last
year we released so so amount for the same purpose. He was jolted, and
he looked left and right, and he said can I repeat what I have just
said.
By the time I finished, he asked for the SUBEB person and
somebody got up. And I asked, did the federal government send money last
year for training? He said, yes; did the federal government send money
this year for training? He said, yes. Where is the money, I asked?
"The
law does not allow us to disburse directly to the coffers of state
government. The law says this money must be paid into the accounts of
SUBEBS, whose officials are appointees of state government.
"This is a sabotage against the efforts of the federal government.
"And
the Akwa Ibom Governor said he can't believe that the federal
government has been sending money for the training of teachers and you
can't tell even the commissioner of education".
Wike explained further that all the while the state government has been funding the training and re-training of teachers.
Dr.
Godswill Akpabio said through the office of the Head of Service that
teachers are being trained, and he said this would be an eye opener for
most of the state governors.
The minister also disclosed that when he
visited the former governor of Bayelsa State, Sylva, and told him that
the federal govern-ment had released N150 million for the train-ing of
teachers for the year, he was sur-prised and called for the state SUBEB
chair-man and asked: "when did F G release this money, three months
ago", the chairman an-swered. Three months ago and I am not aware, and
the commissioner for education is also not aware", the governor was
angry, the minister said.
"Wike explained that the law requires
that this money must not be given directly to the governors, that it
must pass through the state UBEC, it is their responsibility to inform
the appropriate organ of the state executive for them to be aware that
the fed-eral government has sent some money for the training of teachers
in their state.
Now if our efforts are not being comple-mented,
if there is no commitment that these funds are being utilised for the
purpose it has been given, what happens? he asked.
He lamented
that if one look at the com-mitment of the federal and vision in making
sure that funds are released to the states for training of teachers, who
are employees and paid by the states, not that somebody sits somewhere
to sabotage our efforts be-cause there is loop hole in the law.
"He
said such situation would no longer be accept-able, the federal
government is seeking an amendment of the UBEC Act, because when we give
money we also want to sanction if it is not properly used.
If that is not done, obviously, all the ef-fort we are making would be in vain. We can't just fold our hands and watch our efforts go down", he said.
"We have been going from state to state so that all the stake holders are aware of what we are doing."
The
minister also spoke on ways to revamp the Unity Schools across the
country. He said the government is committing a lot of fund to bring
them to the required standard, but cautioned that the work cannot be
done in one year.
He assured that government is well aware that
the standards in the schools are not what they were before, and
disclosed that government has mapped out plans to bring back their
glory.
Some of these plans, he explained, include the
construction and equipping of well stocked library, laboratory and
decent hostel accommodation, while the training of teachers continues.
He
said the idea of the library was to lure both students on and off
campus to read, thereby improving their reading culture and their
performance in public examination.
"Initially, the said,
government would start with about 30-35 schools each year, as fund is
made available, "so that by 2015 we would have touched about 90 percent
of the schools".
On motivation of teachers in the Unity Schools,
Wike said, the first step was to address the anomaly of the existence of
casual teachers. He disclosed that government has approved the
regularisation of the 1,350 casual teachers into full employment,
stressing that you can't expect any measure of commitment from workers
who have been on the same level and salary for the past 10-15 years. |