I feel extremely privileged to be invited to share a thought with you on these very important issues of education, good governance, and national unity.
2. I must admit from the outset that these three concepts namely education, Good Governance, and National Unity are very broad and elaborate, and will require a great deal of time and space to do justice to them. I presume however that the experts who have been invited to address these same issues on this occasion will provide requisite illumination on the topics.
3. In my brief contribution, I wish to draw your attention to the immutable words of renowned Scottish politician and lawyer, Baron Henry Peter Brougham, who proclaimed that:
“Education makes people easy to lead, but difficult to drive, easy to govern, but impossible to enslave”.
4. EDUCATION IN FOREMOST CAPITALIST COUNTRIES
It is perhaps in deference to the above profound thesis of Baron Brougham that civilized capitalist societies in spite of their adherence to the nebulous core value of market forces do not regard education as commodity that will be accessible only to the children and wards of money-bags. Thus in the United States of America, 88.3% of American children attend public schools. According to the US Study Advantage, “State residents can send their children to public schools at no cost although they must generally use an assigned school within their own district. The US Congress has since 1876 required all states to provide such public school systems for their residents.”
Similarly, in the United Kingdom, Education is free for children from five (5) years to sixteen (16) years. Indeed 93% of children in England and Wales attend states school.
In Germany, Education is compulsory for children from age of six (6) and just like United States and Great Britain, public schools in Germany are maintained and paid for by the Government and they are free of charge. If from the above sketch, advanced capitalist economies guarantee free and compulsory education for their children, where then did the Nigerian political elite get the idea that Government has no business running schools which has led it to embark on the ill-advised policy of insisting that education must be privatised.
5. VIRTUAL COLLAPSE OF EDUCATION SYSTEM IN NIGERIA
As I speak to you today, the educational system in Nigeria from primary to secondary and to tertiary levels has virtually collapsed and left at the whims of private entrepreneurs. You are also aware that the Federal Government has been reluctant to implement the Agreement reached with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) since 2009 to improve facilities in the Ivory Towers leading to the current strike by University Teachers which has lingered on for more than four months. How then do we expect to have sound education, good governance, and national unity when the basic foundation of making knowledge available to the citizens is being circumscribed on the altar of profit motive. In their warped minds, Nigeria Political Elite believes that education should be an exclusive preserve of their children to continue to give them leverage over the off-springs of the less-privileged in the contest for political power and the consequent appropriation
of public wealth for private purposes that has become the dominant theme in Nigeria’s political arena. For instance, although Nigeria is regarded as the richest country in Africa and is the sixth largest producer of crude oil in the world, yet, it does not guarantee education for children resident in the country. According to the 2010 Report issued by the Global Campaign for Education (GCE), 8.2 million Nigerian children living in the country do not have access to primary education. Yet the Federal Government spent N4.8 billion in 2011 for the education of children of Nigerian diplomats abroad. Besides when compared with some other African countries, it will become crystal clear that Nigerian authorities treat education for the broad spectrum of the populace with levity. For instance while the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) enjoins countries of the world to devote 26% of their annual budget to
education, Nigeria’s yearly budget to education over the years is below 9%. Compare that with annual budgets for education in Swaziland 24.6%; Botswana 19%; South African 25.8%; Lesotho 17%; Cote d’Ivoire 30%; Ghana 31%; Burkina Faso 16.8%; Morocco 17.7%; Tunisia 17%; Uganda 27%; Kenya 23%; etc. Instead of investing money in education, the Nigerian political elite prefers to loot public treasury by diverting almost 80% fund meant for development into their private pockets according to the World Bank Report.
6. FEDERAL UNITY COLLEGES (FUCS)
You are all aware that during his tenure as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (1999-2007), Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, embarked on the unholy project of selling the 104 Unity Schools to private business concerns. This was not entirely unexpected. After all in 1978 as a Military Head of State, General Obasanjo had told the students, the staff, and the Principal of Federal Government College, Odogbolu, Ogun State at an assembly while on a State Visit to the School that the Federal Unity Colleges would be handed over to State Governments because they are expensive to run. Yet, as Derek Bok correctly stated “if you think education is expensive, try ignorance.” Since Obasanjo second coming and thereafter, successive Federal Governments have been toying with the idea of selling the vast expanse of land including the monumental complexes of the 104 Federal Government Colleges to themselves through their protégés. This is very unfortunate
because against the background of bitter politics characterised by ethnic, racial, and religious bigotry in the first Republic, the Federal Unity Colleges were conceived by the first Prime Minister of Nigeria, Sir Tafawa Balewa, as institutions designed to inculcate a sense of oneness into Nigerian children as well as adults who will work in the colleges apart from making the unity school system a model for secondary education in the country. Consequently, three Federal Unity Colleges were established in 1966, in Warri for Western Region, at Okposi (later moved to Enugu after the civil war) for Eastern Region, and in Sokoto for Northern Region. It is instructive to note that today there are 104 Federal Unity Colleges in the country. The major objectives for setting up the FUCs were but not limited to:
(i) Advancing the cause of national integration;
Promoting academic excellence in secondary education;
Inculcating ethical values including tolerance and understanding in the children for national cohesion;
Providing a model for states and other schools proprietors in the delivery of sound education;
Creating opportunity for Nigerian youths to bond together from their formative years despite varying ethnic, racial, religious, and cultural backgrounds.
Examinations conducted by the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) for secondary schools in the country over the decades have eloquently testified to the fact that the Federal Unity Colleges are indeed centres of academic excellence as their students always excel in such examinations. Instead of consolidating on this legacy, present day political elite who easily falls within the realm of what Ralph Chaplin has characterised as “greedy parasites” are bent on converting the collective national patrimony symbolised by the 104 Federal Unity Schools into their private estates. I wish to assure Nigerians that the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) will continue to resist attempts by the powers that be to sell the Federal Unity Schools to themselves through proxies as we have done since the regime of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo mooted the insidious project on his second coming to power. Our position, which is supported by millions of other Nigerians,
is that those who wish to own private secondary schools should do well to display their business acumen by establishing their own. Nigerians will not accept a situation where the Federal Unity Schools will be auctioned to private business men and women under the guise of dubious Public Private Partnership (PPP) policy.
7. Essentially, it is my view that a political elite that has proved patently incapable of understanding the inherent values of education in organising a modern society cannot reasonably be expected to bring forth to the society good governance. This perhaps explains why the country has remained in the doldrums over the decades. By the same logic a ruling class that has not, or is intellectually impaired to develop noble national ethos on the basis of which Nigerians can be galvanised to attain growth and development, cannot foster national unity. Are you still wondering why the country has remained entrapped in the quagmire of ethnic, racial, and religious bickerings that have continued to widen the cleavages among Nigerians?
I thank you all for your attention and God bless.
Being text of an address delivered by the President of the Trade Union Congress, Comrade Bobboi Bala Kaigama, at a National Summit/Dialogue, Good Governance and National Unity organized by Unity Schools Old Students Associatiion in October 24, 2013 in Abuja.
Follow The Eagle Online Channel on WhatsApp
