Poor teacher quality killing Nigerian public schools – Ezekwesili

A former Minister of Education, Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, has identified poor quality of teachers as one of the factors contributing to the continued decadence and loss of confidence in the Nigerian public schools.
According to Ezekwesili, qualified and competent teachers are the bedrock of quality education in any society.
The former minister, however, lamented the Nigerian situation, where corruption had engendered a steady and continuous decadence in the public school education system.
Ezekwesili was the guest speaker at the 12th Gani Fawehinmi Annual Lecture held in Lagos on Friday by the Nigerian Bar Association, Ikeja Branch.
She spoke on the topic “The collapse of public education and the past, present and future prospects of the Nigerian state.”
She emphasised that “no matter the structure or the building, no matter the amount of textbooks you put in the schools, no matter the information technology gadgets, no matter the funding you provided, if the quality of the teacher is poor,” every other investment in public school would be a waste.
Ezekwesili went to tie the nation’s economic prospect to its ability to not only fund education but to ensure that such funds were appropriately applied.
She said, “Our acceleration in economic growth depends on how many people are educated. Funding education is different from investing in education. An average Nigerian child has everything the society needs to make them compete with the rest of the world.”
She advocated better commitment on the part of the government to reviving the public school.
“The public education system is a principle of right to ensure total inclusion and equity. There is no society that can make progress without anchoring it on education. We must have series of action oriented dialogue to improve our education system,” she said.
In his own subsmission, popular poet, Odia Ofeimun, who was also a guest speaker at the event, said education was at the root of civilisation and an investment in tomorrow.
He called on the government to do invest more for the education sector, saying that “any government that fails to give education to its people will always have xenophobia, tribalism and racism.”
“We need politicians who are not afraid to die for what they believe,” Ofeimun said.
Speaking on the state of the nation, the Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association, Ikeja Branch, Mr. Yinka Farounbi, said if the iconic human rights lawyer  “Gani were to be alive,  he wouldn’t have been surprised with all revelations on corruption now.”
“He knew the high level of corruption in government when he was alive and he fought against it through court cases. This annual lecture is done to commemorate the achievements of the late Chief Gani Fawehinmi who was a renowned anti-corruption crusader. Fawehinmi used his position to fight corruption instead of amassing immense wealth for himself,” Farounbi recalled.