Obviously, since the former governor of Ogun State raised an issue about the construction of bogus Model schools by his successor in office as a misplaced priority and a needless waste of public funds, there seem to be no end to attempts by some, especially appointed officials under the new government, either directly or by proxies of NGOs to stir the hornet’s nest. The veiled attempts to justify the education policy of the Senator Ibikunle Amosun-led government then became an issue, like opening a new vista into looking at the performance index under two different political administrations in Ogun State.
The latest of this being the widely syndicated opinionated articles by
Yusuph Olaniyonu, the government’s Spokesperson and Commissioner for
Information and Strategy. Incisive, but not quite revealing and
educating enough. The ommission might be understandable since it was not
meant to be so, rather a piece of public relations material, not to
set the record straight, but to secure the sympathy of the unsuspecting
public for a government which knows it is found wanting in the education
sector, and in one last desperate attempt to start a political campaign
before election. This may also not be unconnected to the not too
impressive performance of the All Progressive Congress (APC) at the
Ekiti governorship elections just a few weeks ago. That is the political
party to which the current governor of Ogun State, Senator Ibikunle
Amosun belongs, so every available weapon of image laundering might not
be out of place.
Olaniyonu’s deliberate oversite belies the clear departure from the
policies of two different political administrations at different times;
the signpost of which is their directional focuses in the education
sector. One had taken the ‘people’ as the centre piece of all government
policies and programmes while another is so entranced and had taken
‘objects’ (for whatever it is worth in naira and kobo) as its prime
focus. It is from here every other thing else derives.
Perhaps Yusuph had been away from Ogun State for too long not to know; but the records should be able to speak to him now as the Commissioner for Information, that the Tai Solarin University of Education, the very first of its kind in Nigeria was founded by the immediate past administration in the state. The instructive thing relative to this was that there are two ‘kinds’ of ‘rich’ people in life: those who made people, and those who made things or money. The richer of the two is better imagined. It is also instructive that bogus structures, all in the name of ‘Model Schools’ (notwithstanding at what costs which could better be deployed in other sectors in the knowledge and education supply chain) do not do the teachings but ‘model teachers’. These are the feeds which the University of Education are meant to supply. It is not encouraging that knowledgeable people should forget mind blowing feats such as this initiative, especially if and when such are calculated to build human capacities which are meant to regenerate, reinvent with multiplier effects. History should not be rewritten in a hurry.
Perhaps Yusuph had been away from Ogun State for too long not to know; but the records should be able to speak to him now as the Commissioner for Information, that the Tai Solarin University of Education, the very first of its kind in Nigeria was founded by the immediate past administration in the state. The instructive thing relative to this was that there are two ‘kinds’ of ‘rich’ people in life: those who made people, and those who made things or money. The richer of the two is better imagined. It is also instructive that bogus structures, all in the name of ‘Model Schools’ (notwithstanding at what costs which could better be deployed in other sectors in the knowledge and education supply chain) do not do the teachings but ‘model teachers’. These are the feeds which the University of Education are meant to supply. It is not encouraging that knowledgeable people should forget mind blowing feats such as this initiative, especially if and when such are calculated to build human capacities which are meant to regenerate, reinvent with multiplier effects. History should not be rewritten in a hurry.
Records in Ogun State government custody should also be adequate enough
to speak to the idea that several citizens of Ogun State who made first
class were sent by the last administration to study for their Masters
at various universities abroad under the Human Capital Development
programme (HUCAP) initiated under the Otunba Gbenga Daniel
administration. Still talking about human beings as the centre focus of
government policies? The first batch of fifteen left the shores of
Nigeria in 2004 to Nothumbra University, Coventry University, University
of Lancashire, while subsequent batches were admitted to same set of
universities including Nottingham University and Queen Mary University
of London.
If late Chiefs Obafemi Awolowo and Bisi Onabanjo were to be alive,
definitely it is not likely they would have reduced the concept of ‘free
education’ to this sharing of bags and books which are outside, nor
cover current curriculum in schools as it is being celebrated by agents
of the new government in Ogun State. It looks like this has been reduced
to a clichΓ© and political catch phrase to mock the poverty of the
people. Definitely, not in an electronic and digital age when virtually
all available knowledge are now captured digitally on electronic
devices. Governments should become more creative, and not being lazy
about some old tricks which do not and cannot serve the requirement of
the modern age. There are lot more components which make up the search
for, and acquistion of knowledge, and these are what determines the
standard of education; not only in its availability or quantities but in
its adaptation to new realities which are the hallmarks of it
qualities. All these can only be made available in terms of training and
exposures. One would think the HUCAP project and the establishment of
four new ICT polytechnics which the South West Resource centre
(established by the previous administration to provide complimentary
resources in Information and Communication support) were set to address.
Just as one would also think that government records in custody of the
commissioner should contain files that reveal that, rather than books,
computers were distributed to secondary schools under the last
administration, so was the Simeon Adebo Library re equipped. All these
looks like providing ancillary support base for the acquisition of
knowledge.
On the flip side of infrastructures in the education sector, the
several new lecture halls and Theatres (800, 1000, 1500 seaters) at the
Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, Tai Solarin University of Education, Olabisi
Onabanjo University could not have passed anyone’s notice. Not so with
the College of Applied Sciences and Vocational Technology at TASUED.
Except if we are not going to agree with the cybernetic relations
between education and physical development, the Sports hall at MAPOLY
will make the diary of lists of achievements in education infrastructure
to be credited to the immediate past administration in Ogun State. The
Moshood Abiola Polytechnics administrative buildings was also redesigned
and renovated, while the schools auditorium under construction but
abandoned for many years was completed in the last administration.
The flagship of the Senator Ibikunle Amosun government’s policy on
education in Ogun State appears to have been rested on the construction
of twenty six model schools. The fact that none of these was ready even
in almost three years, yet after several promises of deliveries since
2012 also point to the fact that the growth in the education sector
cannot be premised on structures.
When speaking of statistics, governement officials should be able to do
so with every sense of responsibilities. The idea that enrolment
figures in public primary schools was celebrated to have increased from
174,820 in 2011 to 214,837 in 2012 could also not be a function of, and
in relative terms to the proposed new model schools which are still
under construction. Curiously, out of the over 200,000 pupils that were
enrolled into the primary school level, the fact that a mere 165,536
made it to the Junior Secondary Schools suggests that some things do not
add up. Could any other thing have been wrong? It may be revealing and
educative to test the poverty index of citizens of Ogun State in the
last three years to be able to explain what matrix is at play here.
Could the people have been so impoverished to have made preferences for
public education against private schools? Those who could not make it to
secondary schools might have failed to go higher, should we then say
this is in appreciation of the supposedly ‘new standard’ foisted on them
by the new regime, or that parents could not longer afford the ‘meager’
charges still existing as payments and levies in most of these schools?
There are many questions begging for answers here.
However, if the Higher Education Performance (HEP) rate of Ogun State
increased from 18 per cent in 2011/2012 to 49.8 per cent in 2012/13
academic session, are we then to agree that the students’ performance
had suddenly improved in ‘just a year’ of the new administration, all
thanks to uncompleted ‘model schools’ without ‘model teachers’? Or are
we to suggest that students who were in their final years in 2012 were
admitted in 2011 and they must have caught up with such new ‘standards’
in just a year? It is also not clear how the mere promises of Housing
and car loans which The government just made a few weeks ago in 2014;
clear three years into an administration and in less than eight months
to go for the regime could have been instrumental to serve as a
motivation to changing the performance index in the education sector.
It definitely must be a tall order expecting the new government to appreciate that the Otunba Daniel administration employed two thousand teachers every year under his administration, all in a bid to increase the manpower requirements needed in the schools, while spending much of the funds coming from the federal governments through the State Universal Basic Education (SUBEB) on building infrastructure and classrooms in primary and some secondary schools, and renovating others. In this clime, the federal government would have be relegated to the background so that SUBEB and other NGO projects now wear the cap of the new government in power.
–– Oliyide was Special Assistant to Otunba Gbenga Daniel, Governor of Ogun State (2003-2011), and writes from Ibadan.
It definitely must be a tall order expecting the new government to appreciate that the Otunba Daniel administration employed two thousand teachers every year under his administration, all in a bid to increase the manpower requirements needed in the schools, while spending much of the funds coming from the federal governments through the State Universal Basic Education (SUBEB) on building infrastructure and classrooms in primary and some secondary schools, and renovating others. In this clime, the federal government would have be relegated to the background so that SUBEB and other NGO projects now wear the cap of the new government in power.
–– Oliyide was Special Assistant to Otunba Gbenga Daniel, Governor of Ogun State (2003-2011), and writes from Ibadan.
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