The Minister of Education in Nigeria, Tahir Mamman has said that the government is working to ensure that none of the nation’s children is left without education.
He stated this when the Governor of Anambra State, Charles Soludo paid a courtesy call on him in Abuja, Nigeria.
The Minister said the government at the federal level would continue to promote policies and provide necessary infrastructures, especially at the basic education level because of its significance.
“We believe knowing that that level of education is actually a substantial part of the system.
“So we will continue to provide the policies to ensure that no state is left behind.
“And no child of Nigeria is left without education because for us leaders, leaving that category of people out of education is a very serious abdication of our responsibility.”
He commended Anambra state for the feats so far achieved in the education sector urging states across Nigeria to make the state their role model.
“We will be leaning on you to serve as a model of what we want states to be in terms of meeting their obligation.
“If other states are doing what you are doing, we wouldn’t be at this level. We all must be committed because education is at the corner of all our progress and development,” he said.
Earlier, the Anambra State Governor said there was the need for the country to continually make substantial investments in the education system, especially in public primary and secondary schools to provide children of the poor with access to quality basic education.
According to him, the move will break the cycle of poverty across states in the country.
Governor Soludo disclosed that the state recently paid three years of counterpart funding beginning from 2019 back to back to the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, for the state to access more funds to develop the basic school level.
He said cumulatively the state government has also in recent times employed over 8,000 teachers certified by the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria, TRCN, to further improve the basic education sector, stressing that the move was because of appalling discoveries made in the sector.
“Anambra state has four strata of educational provision, categorized into private schools, mission public schools, mission private schools, and public-public schools.
“Recent analysis indicated that the weakest link in the whole chain happens to be the public schools.
“The public schools are where you have the children of the poorest of the poor, and these are schools that are poorly resourced, with insufficient teachers and lacking facilities
“All the laurels and outstanding performances recorded by students and candidates from Anambra State usually come from private and missionary schools because public education has been neglected in the state over time.
“We have just compiled a list of 21 schools in each local government, totalling about 420 of them.
“We have decided to intentionally uplift the public education system in the state,” said the Governor.
According to the Governor, the state is making the public school system smart so that children of the less privileged can have access to quality education and break the cycle of poverty.
PIAK
