Declare State Of Emergency On Education, FG Tells Govs

The National Economic Council (NEC) has directed the 36 governors of the federation to declare a state of emergency on the education sector.
The action is geared towards arresting the out-of-school children, promoting adult literacy and special needs education, reviving Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), and Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET), among others.
This is as NEC, consisting of the Governors and Ministers in the Economic Management Team, including Minister of Finance, Minister of Budget and National Planning as well as the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), failed to discuss the minimum wage.
Meantime, governors have supported President Muhammadu Buhari’s position that states that have not paid salaries should not benefit from the last trench of Paris Club Refund.
Briefing State House correspondents after the NEC, monthly NEC chaired by the Vice President, Prof Yemi Osinbajo at the Council Chamber Presidential Villa, Abuja, yesterday, the Deputy Governor of Edo State, Comrade Philip Shuaibu stated that the meeting deliberated on the report of the NEC ad-hoc committee on the revival of the education sector in Nigeria.
He said that it was resolved that “all governors to declare a state of emergency in the education sectors of their respective states and demonstrate their commitment to revamping education.”
Shuaibu explained that the ad-hoc committee’s interim report observed that a multi-frontal approach was required to tackle the various factors militating against the achievement of the nation’s educational objectives, in view of the multi-dimensional nature of the crisis in the education sector.
He said the committee strongly recommended that the Federal Government, states and local governments collaborate to vigorously implement, and sustain action on the 10 pillars of the Ministerial Strategic Plan developed by the Federal Ministry of Education.
He said, “Among the areas of attention are: the issue of out-of-school children, promoting adult literacy and special needs education, reviving Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET), strengthening basic education, prioritizing teacher education, capacity building and professional development, ensuring quality and access in tertiary education, promoting ICT in education, boosting library services in education etc.”
He further stated that NEC resolved that the federal and state governments should allocate a minimum of 15 per cent of their budgets to education in order to revolutionalise the sector, as well as constitute special task force to manage the funds and oversee the infrastructural overhaul of selected schools for intervention across the federation.
He said council decided that while the interim report was being reviewed by the members of the council, a more detailed report should be prepared and presented at the next NEC meeting when decisions would be taken on the proposed recommendations.
He said, “There is a strategic plan developed by the federal ministry of education beyond that you know the world is going global and technology is driving the world, if you look deeply, our major areas of development beyond infrastructure is the basic education and teachers and the council discovered that we need to also look into the area of technical education out of school children.