BUHARI GOVERNMENT HAS DONE TREMENDOUSLY WELL IN EDUCATION FUNDING – HON NDUBUISI NWANKWO: Read Full Article
The Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC),for Rivers South-East Senatorial district, Hon Ndubuisi Nwankwo PhD, has revealed that the present federal government led by President Mohammadu Buhari has done tremendously well in education funding while revealing that corruption in education sector continues to undermine investments, while critics downplay funding by focusing only on budgetary allocations, urging a more comprehensive re-evaluation of expenditure. Continue Reading
The grassroot politician , who was speaking to newsmen in Port Harcourt, as part of his message to mark the 2022 edition of the globally celebrated Teachers Day, a day set aside by the United Nations to acknowledge the sacrifices of teachers, noted that measuring financing of education sector should include total education budget of each year by both federal and state budgets and other financial commitments in their totality.
The social rights crusader observed that this year’s Teachers Day should mirror on how corruption undermines educational policies, investments and create an unfriendly learning environment for our youths.
The vocal, fearless and bold Omuma local government breed unbleached democrat, hinted that the 1999 Constitution places a premium on education by placing it on the Concurrent List, thereby laying the responsibilities of budgeting and underwriting qualitative education on both the Federal and State Governments, as according to him,what the above implies is that the task of delivering quality education, is a collective collaboration of government at all levels.
Hon Nwankwo, who has undoubtedly become one of the motivating factor for the young people in politics, opined that the total education budget for each year is therefore a reflection of both federal and state budgets and should be viewed other financial commitments in their totality.
“The allocation to education in the federal budget should not be considered via allocation to the Federal Ministry of Education and also academic institutions alone, but should include allocation to the Universal Basic Education, transfers to TETFUND and refund from the Education Tax Pool Account to TETFUND, he said.
The candidate, speaking from his scholarly background, noted that the aggregate education budget in all 36 states of the Federation and that of the Federal Government, combined with the internally generated revenues of the educational institutions themselves were also subjects that require attention, which according to him, some critics of government are not aware in funding of education.
The Public Relations Expert and Candidate to beat disclosed that In line with the National Policy on Education, President Mohammadu Buhar’s administration has been implementing the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme to provide a free balanced meal per day for each child that attends public primary school in order to encourage school enrolment and facilitate accesses to universal basic education.
The Rivers State Youth delight and symbol of frontiers on democratic dividends,sighted that to mitigate the impact of security challenges on our schools, President Mohammadu Buhar signed the Safe Schools Declaration ratification document in December 2019.
The Federal Ministry of Education followed up and developed the Minimum Standard for Safe Schools document in 2021, all part of the Safe Schools Initiative.
The Safe Schools Initiative is an expression of government’s commitment to continue to work towards the protection of students, teachers and the school environments.
He categorically stated that students in various universities use different terminologies to describe different forms of corruption they experience on our campuses.
There is sorting or cash for marks/grades, sex for marks, sex for grade alterations, examination malpractice, and so on.
He regretted that Sexual harassment has assumed an alarming proportion at different university campuses. Other forms of corruption include pay-roll padding or ghost workers, lecturers taking up full time appointments in more than one academic institution, including private institutions, lecturers writing seminar papers, projects and dissertations for students for a fee, and admission racketeering, to mention only the most glaring corrupt practices.
He briefed that the next Government in Rivers State after the victory of APC from 2023 will continue to fund education within realistically available revenue, urging stakeholders, including the media to equally advocate for transparency in the amount generated as internally generated revenue by educational institutions and how such funds are expended.
“Corruption in the expenditure of internally generated revenue of tertiary institutions is a matter that has strangely not received the attention of stakeholders in tertiary education, including union.
According to him, Corruption is eroding the practical purpose of education at all levels, primary, secondary and tertiary,and must be adressed before it consume the future Nigeria youths.
