Nigeria’s Education sector has again been allocated much lower than the 26 percent of national budget recommended by the United Nations.
The global organisation recommended the budgetary benchmark to enable nations adequately cater for rising education demands. But in the proposal presented to the National Assembly on Tuesday, President Muhammadu Buhari allocated only 7.04% of the 8.6 trillion 2018 budget to the education.
The total sum allocated to the sector is N605.8 billion, with N435.1 billion for recurrent expenditure, N61.73 billion for capital expenditure and N109.06 billion for the Universal Basic Education Commission. The allocation is lower than the 7.4 percent the government gave the education sector in the of N7.4 trillion 2017 budget. The breakdown of the N550 billion allocated in 2017 was N398 billion for recurrent expenditure, N56 billion for capital expenditure and N95 billion to UBEC.
This decrease, apart from expanding the gap with respect to the UN recommendation, is also in spite of the government committing to increase spending on education. The university teachers were protesting poor funding of universities and the failure of government to implement an agreement it signed in 2009 with ASUU to improve facilities and enhance staff welfare at the institutions. The Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics, ASUP, is currently threatening to embark on an indefinite strike of its own on Monday November 13 unless the federal government pays its 2016 shortfalls and all outstanding arrears.
*Hmmm I see more ASUU Strikes next year!!!
109 billion was budgeted for universal basic education, those who are analysing the budget are only seeing the 71 billion. No government in our federation has ever budgeted anything close to 13% for education, so l am not surprised.
ReplyDeleteMIT in the states made over $40 billion from their patents a few years ago. An amount that is bigger than our federal budget
Lecturers in Nigerian universities are only after the butts of their female students. No research going on in our schools. In the seventies and early eighties when government was giving them research grants they were marrying more wives, buying cars and all forms of trash. Government had to stop .
Josephine the great
109 billion was budgeted for universal basic education, those who are analysing the budget are only seeing the 71 billion. No government in our federation has ever budgeted anything close to 13% for education, so l am not surprised.
ReplyDeleteMIT in the states made over $40 billion from their patents a few years ago. An amount that is bigger than our federal budget
Lecturers in Nigerian universities are only after the butts of their female students. No research going on in our schools. In the seventies and early eighties when government was giving them research grants they were marrying more wives, buying cars and all forms of trash. Government had to stop .
Josephine the great
But I heard Education, Agriculture etc got the 'lion' share in the 2018 budget.
ReplyDeleteAm I surprise? Not at all!
ReplyDeleteOnly in Nigeria.
God help this country....
When am illiterate is ruling, nothing short of such is expected
ReplyDeleteEven the so called analyst is too dull to check numbers correctly, or is that the intent was to malign.
ReplyDeleteHow is 7.04% of 8.6T = 605.8Bln lower than 7.4% of 7.4T = 550Bln as stated in the article?
The allocations for this year are clearly HIGHER than 2017 but lower in percentage as the total value of the budget increased by over 1 T.
Everyday, one gets to wonder at the value of education in Nigeria when even the educated mix up basic things.
wonder what budge the health sector got
ReplyDelete