60 YEARS OF FREE EDUCATION; NIGERIANS LAUD AWO

IT is 60 years today since that seminal intervention in the educational development of the Western Region by Chief Obafemi Awolowo in January 1955 – the proclamation of the Free Universal Primary Education scheme; a revolutionary initiative that has since remained a signpost and reference point for policy direction and development in the sector.

Sixty years after, all agree that that scheme – a product of vision and clear-headed planning, as well as meticulous implementation of programmes – leapfrogged the educational development of the region and placed its successor states of today (Oyo, Ogun, Osun, Ondo and Ekiti) at a vantage position above others.
In his assessment of the scheme on Friday, foremost educationist and former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ibadan, Emeritus Professor Ayo Banjo, told Saturday Tribune: “I think you would find out that the level of education in these states is higher than anywhere else in the country. There is no doubt at all about that.”
But he has his regrets: “What is sad is that the effort which was put into starting the project has not been kept up with the same degree of commitment. I think it’s pretty obvious that things have not moved forward since free education was instituted in the Western Region. So many people have dropped out of school altogether; and that wasn’t the vision of those who introduced free primary education.”
Prof Banjo is not impressed with the current level of funding of education in the country; neither does he regard as tenable, the oft-repeated excuse of lack of fund as to why this laudable initiative cannot be sustained.
The Free Universal Primary Education scheme, he noted, was initiated and implemented successfully at a time about 40 to 50 per cent of the Western Region government budget was devoted to education.
“The complaint that is regularly made today is that there are no funds; but I don’t think this is a very strong reason for not continuing free education in the country. All it requires is putting education as a priority case in the budget. That’s the way to fund education.
“May I remind you that when in fact it was found by the Awolowo government that the money raised through the budget wasn’t enough, a special education tax was imposed; and people paid it. They paid because they were seeing the benefit of what they were paying for.
“I think it is a matter of being absolutely convinced that education deserves to be funded above so many other things that government spends money on; because the surest way of developing the country is by investing in the children, in education, at all levels, not particularly the primary and secondary level.”
He, however, conceded that for tertiary education, people should be prepared to pay something – not necessarily the actual economic cost of being in the university, but something to add to what the government is paying to support them there.
On this score, he and the Dean of Faculty of Education, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Professor Philip Olu Jegede, seem to be on the same page.
While also acknowledging the positive impact of Chief Awolowo’s free education on the region, Jegede said, “the initiative was a novel one; and that’s what we are building on till today. If you look at South-West today, it’s way ahead of other geo-political zones regarding literacy; and it was where he stopped that we are continuing today.
“But what Papa Awolowo was working towards was literacy; and it was about basic education. Government, realistically speaking, cannot fund tertiary education fully. Basic education is what is compulsorily free; and you may want to extend that to senior secondary.”
Is free education still feasible? Banjo believes so; but added that government has to do more in the area of funding.
“It’s a matter of priority. You can’t fund free education by only committing maybe 13 per cent of the budget to education. In any case, when we complain about lack of fund, I think we should also be concerned with the way government raises revenue. I don’t think revenue through taxation has been seriously pursued in this country. Everybody knows that the only people who pay their fair share of taxation are the people employed in the public service.
“If there are 170 million citizens in this country, it ought to be possible to realise the kind of revenue through taxation that can make free education possible. And not just taxation, but add what you derive from other sources like oil.
“If things are properly managed, I think it ought to be possible to have free education. And we will be doing ourselves a very good thing by making sure that all our children are properly educated. If the commitment is strong enough, we should be able to do it; and there is no other way of developing a country than through developing the people,” he said.
Professor Banjo is not the only one who has this strong feeling about the free education scheme. The Provost, Michael Otedola College of Primary Education, Noforija-Epe, Lagos State, Professor Olu Akeusola, who said without Chief Awolowo’s free education “we wouldn’t have been where we are now,” however, believes seeking free education is almost totally now a ‘paradise lost’, given the curious and unhelpful type of government Nigeria has stuck to.
Akeusola told Saturday Tribune: “Papa Awolowo was able to do free education successfully because of the decentralisation of power to the regions. The day we formed ourselves into non-existing republic, with unnecessary amalgamation and unnecessary concentration of power at the centre, that was when we killed Nigeria.”
He, however, lauded the scheme. “The legacy of Awolowo has never failed. If you see the South-West, we are still leading in education as a result of the free and qualitative education Awolowo instituted in the South-West.
“But that held sway until around 1979 up to 1983. The moment the military came and truncated the Second Republic and we reverted to the so called unnecessary Federal Government that is unitarily controlled by the centre, we killed that idea.
“We thought we wanted to move at a kind of unified pace. We created JAMB and a lot of other nonsensical things. We believed that a region must be retarded for another region so that we could move at the same pace. It will never work; not until we revert to the regional thing that we practised,” he added.
Akeusola made a case for a regional government comprising a weak centre and six regional governments.
“We should have six vice-presidents, each controlling each of the regions just as we had the premier in the olden days; and the six vice-presidents will be reporting to the president,” he said.
According to him, the Federal Government has no business running more than three ministries – Ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Defence. Every other ministry should be reverted to the region and the state.
“When Ebola started, each of the states, especially Lagos and Rivers, controlled Ebola very well. If you still look at the educational system now, the non-Federal Government-controlled states are doing fairly better. So, let the Ministry of Education and some other ministries be reverted to the regional or state governments. If the Ministry of Education is controlled by either the region or the states, they would have been able to formulate policies that would be instrumental to the development of education as per the immediate need of that state.”
Ajimobi lauds Awo
Oyo State governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, also lauded the vision of Chief Awolowo declaring that his own government’s education policy is anchored on the ideals of Awo.
“I rejoice with the biological Obafemi Awolowo family on the 60th anniversary of the free education which is today. I also rejoice with ourselves, political offspring of the sage. His vision of quality education and development is the driving force of our government. It is no coincidence that I am kicking-off my second term campaign today, day of the anniversary. Even though we are manifestly walking on his foothpath, we are honouring him with the kick-off. Governments that seek immortality in the hearts of the people must pattern their policies after Awolowo as we are doing in Oyo State,’” the governor said in a statement signed by his Special Adviser on Media, Dr Festus Adedayo.
On January, 17, 1955, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, then Premier of the Western Region of Nigeria, introduced the popular Universal Primary Education – a policy that ensured that several people from the region had access to free education. Today, 60 years after, stakeholders in education assess the impact of that scheme on Nigeria’s future.
Dr Bayo, Oladipo, a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Educational Administration, University of Lagos, gives us a brief history of the scheme.
“That year, 1955, was when the expansion of education commenced in the Western Region. “Before then, it had been the efforts of the missionary as well as the British government. With the MacPherson Constitution of 1952, power was given to the regions, and in 1954, the review of educational policy gave the Western Region the power to introduce their own policy on education, and based on that, Chief Obafemi Awolowo introduced the Universal Free Primary Education in the Western Region. So we have to commend the vision of Chief Obafemi Awolowo; he saw that education was a weapon for development, and that was why he encouraged parents to send their children to school.
“A lot of schools were built; teacher training centres were introduced; vocational training centres were introduced so as to be able to expand the scope of education in the Western Region, and education was made free so that people who could not afford sending their children to school would not have any excuse. And that was why they were educated at that time,” he said.
Dr Idou Keinde, a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Human Kinetics and Health Education, University of Lagos, believes that the failure in government today can be traced to the inability of successive governments to learn from Obafemi Awolowo’s example.
“I believe, as an educationist, that the government should do something about re-introducing free education. You see, with that policy, the government was closer to the people, and that accounted for the advancements recorded in this part of the country,” he said.
Dr Keinde also noted that Awolowo’s programmes flourished because of the system of government practiced at the time:
“It is this pseudo-federalism we are practising today. Awolowo had a free hand. He knew what his people wanted, and he started it. This pseudo-federalism is the major cause of this. All of us are now looking towards Abuja; our governors now all rely on Abuja, and that’s a big problem.”
Dr Bayo Oladipo, on the other hand, believes that the government alone cannot be blamed for the decline in the quality of education:
“Everyone has his own share of the blame. The government has its own share of the blame as regards funding, the parents should be blamed because they should be involved in the education of their children; the teachers should be blamed for not showing adequate commitment; the students should also be blamed for not showing enough passion. Education is not provided by one person,” he said.