FG must emphasise technical education now – educationist

A renowned educationist, Dr Israel Oseafiana has advocated a restructure of the educational sector where emphasis would be more on technology and skill acquisition, urging the federal government to initiate a deliberate policy to develop the education sector and prepare students for self-reliance upon graduation from the various tertiary institutions, stressing that the current policy on education only prepares students to become dependent on government for job creation.

Oseafiana who stated this in an exclusive interview in Ogun State recently said one of the measures to address youth unemployment was for government to create the enabling environment for the people to maximise their potentials.

He cited China, Japan and other countries where science and technology were being emphasised even at the primary and secondary levels of education and how they have been able to address youth unemployment. “In China, a family can start production activity in their house and before you know it, they will start exporting the product abroad because there is constant power supply.”

Speaking on the state of the nation, Oseafiana urged FG to visit the report of the 2014 national conference, stressing that the agitations in different parts of the country simply shows that something is fundamentally wrong. He cited the mayhems by the Fulani herdsmen which has claimed many innocent lives and called on government to urgently address it to avert such needless waste of human capital in the country.

Commenting on the recently proscribed Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and the post University Matriculation Examination (UME), Oseafiana who had lived and worked in more than twelve countries of Africa described JAMB as only a clearing house, and congratulating the ministry of education for trusting the various universities to determine the quality of applicants they want to engage in their institutions.

The academician however acknowledged the contribution of JAMB in its time; “It does not mean that JAMB had not done a good job over the years, it’s just that the element of corruption in the society having crept into every segment has also affected JAMB to the extent that it now gives people qualifying credentials when they do not really merit it in person.

“Then there is the infrastructural flaws compounding institutions and businesses in the country. I lived in Botswana for almost two years where the light never blinked once and everything that happens in that country is computerized.

“Every adult that is up to 18 years gets a national ID. You can live in any part of the country and you are assigned a plot of your own. If you are gainfully employed, the organisation gives you a mortgage loan which you pay over several years; that way, everybody gets a good and clean house to live in. I know a number of Nigerians who are lecturers in the University of Botswana; they would never come back to Nigeria because University of Botswana is the highest paying university in Africa.”

Oseafiana expressed concern that corruption had destroyed the different sectors of the economy education inclusive.

He further said, “But here what do we find even when government provides infrastructure, it is given to one class of people. Now, sometimes government build markets, they allocate stores on political basis and assign stores to people who don’t really need them. These people now become agents or middle men who now have to increase the cost for the average market man or woman who really needs it. These are issues government should address.

“Often times, government actually appoints technocrats in education but when they go there, because of the system they operate in, nothing much is seen. So it is no longer the vision of the helms man at that particular point but what the party that appointed him wants. We must have 100 party people given job here whether they are qualified or not. So that aspect corrupts the entire system. Just as it affects the educational system, it affects the health system.”

Speaking further on the falling standard of education, the renowned educationist hinged the blame on educational institutions who give qualifying credentials to some persons who did not deserve them and parents who sponsor such perfidy.

His words, “But if we are not able to nip corruption in the bud such that the area where officials now compromise or allow special centres to operate even under their nose without doing anything is eradicated, then the standard of our education will continue to go down. Government cannot deny the fact that it does not know about the existence of special centres which the children of the poor cannot afford.

“I went around a centre when a public exam was being conducted and a particular family had already arranged with an invigilator who brought out examination questions while the exam was going on, he crossed the reception area and went to the gate where someone was already waiting and they took the paper out. I’m sure that paper was eventually submitted after it was written by somebody else. So you will discover that these days, a candidate could have nine ‘A’s but when they get to the point where they face the universities themselves who naturally will be more strict than the JAMB, such people become jittery.

“And because you must always use a lie to cover a lie they go to the next level to look for someone within that system to buy over at all cost and so the problem migrates from one level to the other. And such people when they are eventually admitted, I can tell you they cannot sit down to read. They will always get a permanent lecturer or a HOD they will put on their own pay roll so that they can always influence the academic performance of that person all through the four years or so in the university.”