Nigeria Content Online

Along with the
power and the rail systems, there is little disagreement among
Nigerians that the education sector is in the doldrums and needs an
urgent and sustained heavy government rescue intervention. Most
employers or office managers are daily confronted with this reality in
their dealings with barely literate subordinates. For those who don’t,
the yearly ritual of wailing whenever any of the nation’s three post
secondary examination bodies release the results of their exams should
be no less educating.

Government
officials have also always made the right noises. In early 1998, during
the 45th meeting of the National Education Council (NEC) held in
Kastina, the minister of education at the time exhorted participants to
find a solution to the parlous state of the sector.

Talking about the
extent of the rot in the sector, he listed some of the symptoms to
include, among others, decline in standards, deterioration of
facilities, examination malpractices, mass promotion syndrome and the
poor results churned out year in, year out.

The figures are
sobering. In 2010, for instance, the West African Examination Council
(WAEC) results showed that only 24.9 percent of the candidates that sat
for the exam obtained five credits, including Mathematics and English
Language. In 2009, the figure was 25.99 percent. The results had
fluctuated from 23 percent pass in 2008; 21 percent in 2009 and 20
percent in 2010.

Many factors have
been posited as responsible. Examination malpractices, along with poor
preparation of students for an examination, is seen by experts as both
an outcome and a cause of the problems in the nation’s education
sector. This is cumulative in effect and often, it takes years for the
malaise to become obvious.

Aside from these
factors, the problem posed by the poor management of educational
institutions in the country, both public and private, is also
disturbing. A close assessment of activities in schools has revealed
that students are made to suffer undue amounts of exploitation by
school heads in the name of enrolment fees and assurance of success in
their examinations. This is in spite of the fact that most of the
schools lack basic learning facilities and a complete set of teachers.
In some cases, a school with the services of an English Language
teacher will lack that of a Mathematics teacher. In the end, the school
engages in mass promotion of students as a way out. The effect of all
this on students is staggering.

These various
challenges confronting the nation’s education sector lead to the poor
results and consequently a low skilled workforce in every sphere of
national life. Much needs to be done in the sector, but most
initiatives are hardly carried out. The incumbent federal
administration has also launched its own. The minister of education,
Ruqayyatu Ahmed Rufa’I, is currently working on a policy of
inclusiveness – a variant of the “No child left behind” policy of the
American government.

It is early days
yet. But the disposition of the president, Goodluck Jonathan to this
issue gives some glimmer of hope that things might be different this
time – especially if the president gets the affirmation of Nigerians to
continue in office.

Mr Jonathan
admitted recently that many of the challenges confronting this nation
were because there is a lack of will on the part of those in power to
do the right thing. One of the three Es which he said his
administration would focus on is education. The other two are
electricity and electoral reforms. Education, he says, should be
promoted “as a potent instrument for the transformation of our country”.

At this point in
our nation, it is obvious that there is nowhere else a transformation
needs to take place more than in the education sector. Our political
leaders, as they win our votes to either hold on to the posts they are
occupying or assume new ones, must realise that nothing can change this
country better than the proper education of its citizens. Mr Jonathan
asked Nigerians to insist “that the right thing should be done”.
Nigerians should push for this political statement to be applied to the
nation’s education.

Joe Ikhazaboh writes from Port Harcourt