By Daniel Adeleye
In line with the recommendation by the United Nations Education and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO) for developing countries, the Education Project Coordinator for Actionaid Nigeria, Mrs Kyauta Giwa, has impressed on the Nigerian government to jerk up funds allocated to education sector in the country.
Speaking with journalists at a two-day reflection and action meeting with education stakeholders in Lagos State, organised by Human Development Initiatives (HDI) in collaboration with Actionaid Nigeria, Giwa submitted that increase in the budgetary allocation to the education sector will tackle all the decadence in the sector with a view to improving the quality of knowledge impacted on the pupils.
She explained that in line with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal (SDG4), free and qualitative education is the right of every child which must be provided by the government.
She expressed concern over the proliferation of private schools in the country, especially in Lagos State, saying the state government needs to increase the number of public schools in the areas where there are shortage of schools and tasked the government on decisive action to regulate the activities of private schools.
She attributed the challenges of public education in Nigeria to paucity of funds, lack of adequate training for teachers and quality facilities.
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The Actionaid representative called on government for effective collaboration with non-governmental organisations that have good track records, saying NGOs are development partners whose mission is to complement the good efforts of government and make Nigeria great.
“Education in Nigeria has so many challenges and for us in Actionaid, one of the areas we are looking at is the issue of funding, which has been very low over the years as against the UN recommended 26 percent.”
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