August 10, (THEWILL) – Governor David Nweze Umahi of Ebonyi State, has called for the review of the Nigeria education system with more emphasis on vocational education, which he said would engender self-employment and reliance.
Umahi, who said this in Abakaliki while reacting to the lingering strike embarked by ASUU, called on both parties of the Federal Government and ASUU to shift grounds as an approach to resolve the impasse.
According to him, our basic problem in this country remains security, health and education.
“Our basic problem in this country remains security, health and education. Let me say a little about education, which is in our public domain and which the ASUU strike is and I think that our education system is not being properly educated.
“University education is not for everybody and that is the truth. The basic education every country strives to attain is secondary school and vocational schools. These are the basic schools and when you have these qualifications, you will be able to use them either to start up something or to be able to use it to be employed and while you are in employment, if you don’t have the mercy you will be able to aspire to university education.
“There is a need to review our educational system, it mustn’t be for everybody. I am not ashamed that I have a first degree and my Deputy is a Ph.D holder, it doesn’t matter. It is what you bring on board. So, I cannot see how we cannot sit down with our ASUU leaders and iron out this problem about the ASUU strike.
“I have gone through social media, read newspapers, how students got into trouble just by sitting at home or engaging in means of keeping themselves busy instead of being in schools. There is no way the country will go and borrow N1.1trillion to meet ASUU’s demand, it’s quite unreasonable. Are their demands genuine? Yes, but we can start little by little.
“There must be a commitment on the side of both parties, that look, ASUU is not asking this to take to their houses so to say, they are asking it for our children to better the infrastructure, to better the lecturers and the students. Yes, but we can start with a fraction of that and then have a programme that will run on the platform of sincerity to address all the lots.
“But let me also say that most of the time, our people have a low appetite for maintenance of public works. No matter how much you deploy to these universities, unless the users, the industry, and the regulators, unless they begin to treat public infrastructure as their own in the various universities, it will continue to go bad no matter how much the federal government deploys it.
“So, it is important for ASUU to show some understanding and for those who are negotiating on the side of the government to also show some understanding. Let’s meet ourselves halfway and then open the schools to save the fate of our children”, he stated.
About the Author
Sunday Ogbu is a professional journalist with eight - twelve years experience that had worked with various print and online media. Sunday specializes in news reporting with the aim of educating his readers on current social, political and economic occurences within his area of coverage. Sunday is a strong force to work with in the media industry and uses his positive attitude and tireless energy to encourage others to work hard and succeed. Sunday is inspired daily by his wife and their four children. In his free time, Sunday likes sight-seeing, reading and discussing issues of societal interest.
