…AS PRESIDENT HONOURS LATE ADADEVOH, DECORATES 48 AWARDEES
President Muhamadu Buhari on Thursday, begged the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), to look into the plights of students and call off the protracted industrial action.
The President spoke at the 19th National Productivity Day Celebration And Conferment of National Productivity Order of Merit Award (NPOM), at the State House Conference Center, Abuja.
Buhari, who decorated the 48 eminent Nigerians and organisations in public and private sectors for their high productivity, hardwork and excellence used the occssion to appeal to the Nigerian students in the country’s public tertiary institutions to exercise patience.
According to the President, his administration is trying to address the critical issues in the nation’s universities with the resources available to the Goverment.
Buhari reminded the lecturers that he had on February 1, directed his Chief of Staff, Ibrahim Gambari, the ministers of Education, and Labour and Employment, Adamu Adamu and Chris Ngige to look at the issues and the cause of the strikes in tertiary institutions and address the concerns of the aggrieved unions.
But ASUU, had in statement on Monday disclosed that since the President’s directive on the issue, no meeting had been held by the officials towards mentioned towards resolving the crisis.
According to ASUU, Government’s lack of concern about its demands was the reason for the extension the three-month-old strike by another three months.
Speaking on the theme of this year’s celebration; ‘‘Achieving Higher Productivity Through Improved Education System,’’ Buhari promised that his administration would continue to do everything possible to uplift the standard of the educational system in the country.
He added that his administration recognised that every nation’s life wire depended on the standard of its educational system.
‘‘Therefore, if we desire to transform Nigeria into a competitive, strong, vibrant, productive and sustainable economy, improving our educational system should be accorded the highest priority.’’ He said.
He said his administration has made important headway in the education sector in the areas of the drastic reduction of the number of out of school children from 10.1million in 2019 to 6.9 million in 2020, automatic employment for graduates of education, review of the retirement age of teachers from 60 to 65 years, among others.
“Quality educational system is good not just for the national economy; it is also good for the citizens.
“Ignoring the productivity dimension of education would endanger the prosperity of future generations, with widespread repercussions for poverty and social exclusion.
“It will be difficult to improve our economic performance and overall productivity, without improving our educational system.
“Government notes the emergency situation in our educational system with particular reference to the dearth of qualified and dedicated teachers to enhance the quality of teaching and learning at all levels of our educational system,” he said.
The President hinted that his administration is going to tackle the challenges and in doing that has reviewed the retirement age of teachers from 60 to 65 years.
He disclosed that the years of service have also been reviewed from 35 to 40 years to encourage more graduates to join the teaching profession.
According to the President, his administration has also approved a special salary scale for teachers in Basic and Secondary schools, including provisions for rural posting allowance, Science teachers allowance and peculiar allowance, while prioritising timely promotion and prompt payment of salaries.
Furthermore, Buhari said the reintroduction of bursary award to students in universities and Colleges of Education by his administration comes with assurance of automatic employment upon graduation as well as payment of stipends to Bachelor of Education students.
President Buhari commended the organisers and congratulated the awardees for their various accomplishments and well deserved recognition.
He said the awardees were carefully selected from the multitude of competitors, saying “this award should spur you to greater heights.”
He thanked the Chairman and members of the National Productivity Order of Merit Award Committee, including the management and staff of National Productivity Centre for a job well done, and urged the recipients of the merit award and Nigerians to make productivity their watchword.
In his lecture titled, ‘Achieving Higher Productivity Through Improved Educational System’, Dr Sylvester Onoja, urged the Federal government to split the Ministry of Education into two ministries, the Ministry of Basic Education, which he said should be headed by an educationist, while the second, the Ministry of Higher Education, should be headed by any other professional.
He stressed that the Ministry of Education, should be treated like the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Justice, where only doctors and lawyers are appointed respectively.
“Today, it is difficult to be minister of health, if you are not a medical doctor, and you cannot be a minister of justice, if you are not a lawyer, the same should be applied to the Ministry of Education, basically, it is only those who are trained as educationist that should be Minister of Education.”
Onoja, challenged the state governments to take education seriously.
“I have information that in one of the states of the federation that as at 12th of May, 2022, no student from public schools have registered for WASSCE, those that have registered are from private schools.
“I also have information that in another state of the Federation, in the last Common Entrance Examination, only 74 registered for the examination in a state that has three federal government colleges.
“We must do something drastic about it. There are states in the last 10 years that have not employed a single teacher to teach in public schools. There are no substitute for education.” He said.
The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, in his remarks, said since the inception of the award in 1991, 382 individuals and 97 organisations have been honoured with the NPOM.
Dr Stella Adadevoh and Mr Babatunde Lawal, received posthumous awards at the 2019/2020 edition of the National Productivity Day.
Dr Adadevoh died on August 19, 2014, was recognised for her outstanding performance in the fight against the spread of the Ebola virus in the country, while Lawal, until his death on November 6, 2020, served as Permanent Secretary in the Cabinet Affairs Office.
Babatunde, an economist by training with bias in fiscal policy analysis, management and strategic planning, was commended for his ‘‘thoroughness and paying keen attention to every detail’’ during his tenure as permanent secretary in the Federal Civil Service.
Other recipients include the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Abdullahi Adamu; the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha; immediate past Director-General of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Dr Chike Ihekweazu; Lagos State Commissioner for Health, Prof Akin Abayomi; Chairman and Founder, BUA Group, Abdusamad Rabiu; Chairman of Globacom, Mike Adenuga Jnr; Professor Stanley Okolo, Director General of the West African Health Organization (WAHO) and Allen Onyema, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of Air Peace, among others.
