New Nigerian Newspapers Online Edition

Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Education, Farouk Lawal has said the slow pace of actualizing the objectives of the Universal Basic Education (UBE) schemes in the country could be attributed to engagement of unqualified teachers by the states.

Farouk, who led other house committee members on an over-sight visit to the UBE headquarters in Abuja, told the Executive Secretary of the scheme, Mohammed Modibbo that government lacked the capacity to provide the needed incentives to attract children to school, especially in the rural settings, prompting it to establish the UBE scheme.

He said it is lamentable that the basic education system in the country still grapples without necessary teaching infrastructure despite government funding, stressing that some of the decaying facilities were not receiving the needed attention.

The committee whose aim of visiting the UBE was to ascertain the level of utilization of the 2008 budgetary allocation to the commission, urged it to sustain the laudable idea of establishing the scheme, adding that the Federal Government’s idea of creating the scheme was to motivate interest in basic education, especially at the elementary level.

He explained that the North-Western zone of the country was particularly backward in terms of accessing the benefits of the scheme stating that over 60 percent of the teaching force in the region were unqualified to effectively man the programme.

“Where the teachers themselves are not qualified, they also pose a serious danger to the society and to our educational system.

“Even when the teachers are there, they are ill motivated to discharge their responsibilities. Their condition of service is not commiserate with the kind of work that they are expected to discharge and the level of inspection and monitoring of schools is low,” he added.

He stressed the need for Girl-Child Education to be given priority attention in the scheme, stating that despite the inclusion of educational matters in the concurrent list, states and local government councils still need to strive hard in accessing the funds.

Meanwhile, Mohammed Modibbo who received the National Assembly delegation into the commission, said UBEC has lived up to expectation in the discharge of its statutory responsibilities, stating that a few states were sabotaging the scheme’s efforts at ensuring good basic education nation-wide.