Evidence of the absolute decay of the education system abounds. In public schools across the country, infrastructural collapse is a manifest fact. Virtually in all schools, primary, secondary or tertiary, classrooms are overcrowded. Libraries are full of old, irrelevant books, and laboratories of obsolete equipment.
Frequent strikes by teachers cripple academic activities; the cancer of cultism is now widespread; student population in the league of armed robbers and prostitutes is increasing. Sexual harassment is also contributing its own quota to the destruction of education in the country.
Most disturbing evidence of the decay is the phenomenon of examination malpractice. Mr. Ike Inyechere, Chairman of Exams Ethics Project, an NGO, identified thirty three types of examination malpractices in the country. According to him, there are enough incentives for people to engage in the crime. Ike said: “people are planning to perpetuate examination malpractice because malpractice has become a very big business. It is now a multi-billion naira organized crime business”.
A study reveals that an average of 740,000 results are cancelled each year by major public examination bodies. An average of 450 principals, teachers, supervisors, invigilators and examiners are blacklisted; 360 schools de-recognised and 9,000 students handed to police every year on account of examination malpractices.
The debate is no longer over whether the education system has collapsed or not. The argument now centers around what to do to rescue the system. A seemingly bizarre rescue measure has been proffered by Professor Wole Soyinka. Terribly disturbed by the nasty state of the higher education, Soyinka has called for a-three-year closure of all higher institutions in the country.
He said the measure would allow room for a critical assessment of the schools and a review of their functions. The Professor warned that until his call was heeded by government, the Universities would remain glorified secondary schools that are bereft of a clear cut purpose on youths and education development.
Offering a way out, based on his understanding that lack of adequate funding is the major problem, Professor Goodrum of the University of Camberra, Australia, has suggested that teachers in Nigeria should get involved in political leadership, arguing that only this will ensure adequate resource allocation to the education sector. Goodrum said: “In Australia, political leadership is very important in terms of allocation of resources to education. Realizing this, some years ago, Australian teachers joined the political process actively, some teachers even formed a political party in order to impact on the system. Political platform can be used to influence allocation of resources to education.”
To teachers and human rights activists, more government funding is the solution. They argue that government has not been giving enough to the education sector. Prof. Poju Akinyanju is of the view that government has reduced fund allocation to education over the years. He said that “expenditure on education in Nigeria, the alleged big brother of the sub-region, is lower than in the contiguous African States.”
The issues of funding has set teachers against government for about two decades now. University and Polytechnic lecturers have gone on strike several times over the issue. But instead of changing the situation for better, strikes have only destroyed the system more and more.
All the measures that have been offered, I suppose, can not rescue the education system from the hold of decay. These measures still ignore the inability of government to save the system. I wonder how closure of Universities for three years will rescue the education sector if government interference is still as high as it is. Involvement of teachers in political leadership is also not a recipe. Lots of teachers have always been in government and there is no evidence they have made any impact as regards funding.
Concerning more government funding, the question is if government has the resources to solely shoulder the burden of education. The assumption is that government has enough to adequately fund education. But this assumption is wrong. Nigerian government is run only by oil money and a lot of sectors are competing for the oil money. Corruption, wastage and mismanagement are not left out in the competition. Therefore, leaving the funding of education only to government is inimical to the health of the sector.
Equally wrong is the belief that the education of everybody is the responsibility of government. Some people claim education is the right of every child in the country. I have nothing against this claim. But the question is who has the responsibility to give the right. Parents or government?
The root cause of the sad state of the education system is that government accepted the claim that it is its responsibility to give every child education. And this explains why in the 1970s government took over schools from their original owners. All schools owned by the Missionaries and some interested individuals were taken over by government. As a result, there are 42 public Universities, 45 Polytechnics and about 50 Colleges of Education in the country. Primary and Secondary schools can be counted in thousands.
The frank and sincere solution to education in Nigeria is to first rescue it from the shackles of government. The free education policy of the Federal Government and several State governments should be thrown away. The fact is that qualitative education can not be free. The argument that children of the poor will not get access to education if government reduces its unnecessary involvement has been defeated by the fact that poor people have now preferred tuition fee paying schools to public schools. The number of low-income parents who opt for private schools where qualitative education is being given keeps on increasing.
Given the dilapidation of school buildings; lack of modern equipment in the laboratories; outdated books in the libraries, it is no longer advisable to leave education in the hands of government. All the private schools forcefully appropriated from their owners are now shadows of their old selves. Most of these original school owners are now agitating for the return of their schools.
Government has destroyed the people’s sense of responsibility through its free education policy, a lot of parents no longer feel they should be responsible for the education of their children. Students don’t take their education seriously because it is not their parents that pay for it. Also teachers in public schools are more traders than teachers, since there is nobody to keep them on their toes.
Besides the fact that government has destroyed the people’s sense of responsibility, corruption and inefficiency can not allow any amount of government funding to have impact. Public schools are like other government organizations that have been ruined by corruption and inefficiency. It is time to allow market to rescue the education system.
The argument that the children of the poor will not have access to education is no longer tenable. It is disturbing that the purpose of skills and knowledge acquisition is no longer served by our schools.
*Oyewamide is with the Institute of Public Policy Analysis in Lagos , Nigeria .