THE World Bank’s generous approval of a $611 million grant to support Nigeria’s out-of-school children is worthy of commendaton. The support came at a time that Nigeria is rated as having over 10.5 million out-of-school children, the highest in the world.
The bank’s education specialist and consultant, Mr. Adebayo Solomon, who broke the good news, said the gesture is to support the federal and state governments in their efforts to foster inclusive education and revive growth, in line with the country’s Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP).
The fund, tagged “Better Education Service Delivery for All”(BESDA), has the objective of bringing Nigeria’s out-of-school children back into the classrooms, improving literacy and strengthening accountability for results in basic education. It is also designed to support both the federal and state governments in generating credible and reliable education data.
Currently, the Federal Ministry of Education says that many states are unable to conduct yearly school censuses largely because of the paucity of funds, and partly because the authorities concerned do not prioritise it.
With the World Bank financial intervention, such censuses can now be conducted with relative ease. It is also good to know that the global bank will work with the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) to ensure that the data to be collected will be accurate and verified. This is a step in the right direction, as accurate data collection is essential for the planning and delivery of a quality, all-inclusive education system.
The fund should be judiciously utilised and properly monitored to deliver on its lofty objectives. Nigeria’s ranking as having the highest number of out-of-school children paints a very poor image of the country. The 10.5 million figure is about 50 percent of the estimated 20 million out-of-school children in the world. This high number, according to the Federal Ministry of Education, adversely affects government’s efforts to meet the sustainable development goal of all-inclusive education for all.
Although the Federal Government says it has allocated two percent of the Consolidated Revenue Fund to the Universal Basic Education Programme (UBEP), that percentage is grossly inadequate, considering that no nation can achieve economic prosperity without a sound, inclusive and functional education system. Moreover, the security and stability of the country, to a large extent, depend on the ability to provide functional education for the citizens.
The almajiri and insurgency issues in some of the northern states of the country attest to the problems that having a large number of children out of school pose to the peace and stability of the country. Over 9.5million almajiri are reportedly scattered across many northern states. It is the grave danger that they pose to the society and the need to bring them back to school that made the former President Goodluck Jonathan administration to spend a reported N15 billion on the building of 400 almajiri integrated model schools in the North. About 60 percent of the estimated 10.5m out-of-school children in Nigeria is reported to come from the North.
Sadly, a recent investigation by a national newspaper revealed that almost all the almajiri schools established and equipped with state-of-the-art facilities are now in ruins. The schools were built as part of the efforts to modernize the almajiri education system, which was launched on April 10, 2012 at Gagi, Sokoto state.
While the intervention of the World Bank is heartening and remarkable, Nigerians will like to know the strategies that would be used to bring these children back to school. We advise that large chunks of the World Bank grant should not be spent on consultants as past efforts seem to indicate.
The fund should go into things that can actually attract and keep the children in school, while ensuring that they get great value for the time spent in the institutions. The crisis-torn North-East geopolitical zone is littered with out-of-school children, with thousands of them now living as Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the affected states.
The task of bringing these children back into the school system requires sincerity of purpose. With the World Bank financial support, the task should be less daunting. All levels of government should collaborate to ensure that the plan yields the desired result. Getting these children off the streets and back into the classrooms will lay for them a good foundation for a better and more prosperous future. The children deserve nothing less.