Chairman, National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Prof. Chidi Odinkalu, has advocated a partnership between telecom service providers and the education sector to provide education for all.
He made the call while addressing newsmen on Tuesday in Abuja on the sidelines of the 2015 annual National Management Conference of the Nigerian Institute of Management (Chartered) (NIM).
The Tide gathered that the theme of the two-day conference is “Managing Nigeria for rapid and sustainable development: Redesigning the future.’’
Odinkalu said that the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) was set up to guarantee compulsory education for every Nigerian child, irrespective of geographical location or social status but had not been achieved.
“Basic education is defined as ending at the first three years of minimum education.
“At the moment we are not getting that minimum so we are breaching our own laws.
“Nigeria is said to have between 10.5 to 11 million out-of-school children and that is the rank from which you get the thugs, almajiris and all that.’’
To begin to get results in the education sector, Odinkalu advocated that the laws concerning education should be implemented while seeking ways to reach other Nigerians that might not be able to get conventional education.
“There are populations (adults) that are outside the range of regular education and so we need partnerships to deliver.
“How is it that there are GSM companies everywhere; whatever they did let’s learn from them.
“If Akin Adesina (former Minister of Agriculture) could make the GSM a facility for reaching all farmers, we should make it a facility for reaching all persons with education in the language they understand.
“It is very easy to turn the GSM companies into delivery vehicles so we provide the content and they can provide delivery,’’ he said.
The human rights advocate also said that he was optimistic that though Nigeria did not achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), it could achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Mrs Adaeze Uzo-Kalu, the Executive Director, Asset Management, Nigeria Electricity Liability Management Company (NELMCO), said that inclusion of women and youth in governance was important.
She said women were money and human managers and so would be good managers of the nation if included in running it’s affairs.
“In the last government, I was pleased with the inclusion of women and the only way we can go forward to achieving sustainable development is through women.
“Women are good managers of people and finance; it is therefore imperative to include youth and women for us to have sustainable development.
“If there is no inclusion of women and youth in the cabinet, they are capable of voting out the elected officers since they were instrumental in putting them there in the first place,’’ she said.
The chairman and president of NIM, Mr Nelson Uwaga, said that one of the major setbacks of Nigeria was mismanagement of both human and material resources.
According to him, other nations that are not as blessed as Nigeria have moved on to greater heights while Nigeria is still struggling.
“Nigeria is endowed with the finest of natural resources and the best minds in all walks of endeavour but poor management has been the bane of this nation’s development.