Govt’s attitude to quality education

As I penned this piece, tear rolled down
my cheek. Why? I am feeling sorry for the
future of Nigeria with the way our
government manages education and for
education itself.
For education, I shed tears because it has
never been so bad like it is now –
incessant strike action by Academic Staff
Union of Polytechnics (ASUP), Academic
Staff Union of Universities (ASUU),
National Union of Teachers and bodies of
non-teaching staff.
For more than four months, the ASUU has
paralysed academic activities in most
campuses because of its demand from
the government to improve the condition
of learning schools and promote research.
Ordinarily, one will expect that having an
academic as president would make the
country witness needed reform in
education sector, but we are all dazed to
see that it was the president himself
rendering the efforts of his former
colleagues in ivory tower to engender
quality education useless.
The basic function of education is to train
young ones and equip them with
necessary knowledge to bring about
changes in the society. But the people
the country sees as its future do not have
access to quality and progressive
education; no functional laboratory; no
adequate rooms in school halls; no grant
for research and lectures rooms are
nothing to write home about.
The Federal Government has said it did
not have adequate funds to meet ASUU's
demands. This is because the strike has
not stopped our leaders' wards from
being in school. Their children do not
attend schools with us in Nigeria and
where they do, they are sent to private
universities.
As a result of the poor funding of
education, Nigeria cannot boast of
meaningful invention to aid the cause of
humanity. Our peers across the globe
with functional education system are
producing aircraft, ships, vehicles and
machineries, yet we are proud to take
money to buys those things. The so-called
Asian tigers – Malaysia, Singspore, China,
India etc. achieve the feat because of
their massive investment in education.
The Transformation Agenda of the
present administration is nothing if it is
not anchored on sound education. The
dream to build a progressive would be a
mirage if we fail to invest in education.
Students in most universities stay by
windows to take lectures, with majority of
schools lack facilities to accommodate 50
per cent of students.
Over 1.6 million candidates wrote the
Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination
(UTME) this year and according to the
immediate past Minister of Education,
Prof Ruqqayatu Rufa'i, institutions across
the country could only admit 500,000
candidates, leaving over 1 million
candidates unengaged. What would the
unlucky candidates do? Of course, some
of them would take to crimes such as
armed robbery, kidnapping and
prostitution.
In my opinion, there is absolutely nothing
that will help the president's
Transformation Agenda as the demands of
the ASUU. Yet some unpatriotic elements
want us not to identify with ASUU,
insinuating that the whole thing had been
politicised.
Worrisome is the fact that the National
Association of Nigerian Students (NANS)
president who is supposed to be informed
and fight good cause turned his back
against our lecturers. Yinka Gbadebo is
not a student as confirmed by the NANS
senate leadership, thus it is natural that
he will not fight for the interest of the
students.
Since President Goodluck Jonathan
complained of paucity of funds, I suggest,
on behalf of all students who mean well
for education and Nigeria, that the office
of the First Lady be scraped; the budget
of the senate and overheads of the
ministers be cut down to fund
universities.
If President Jonathan is not ready to fund
education ade1quately and allow us to
return to classroom, he should resign and
give people with better idea to lead.
•Kamaludeen, 200-Level Geography,
NSUK