World Literacy Day: NUJ calls for stronger commitment to education in Nigeria

As the world commemorates World Literacy Day, the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) has urged both the federal and state governments to take the occasion as a call to action in addressing the nation’s lingering education challenges.

The union emphasized that while efforts have been made by different institutions and stakeholders to improve Nigeria’s education sector, these efforts remain inadequate compared to the scale of the problem.

A new UNESCO Global Education Monitoring Report paints a worrying picture: 251 million children worldwide are still out of school (OOS), reflecting only a one percent improvement since 2015. This slow progress highlights the urgent need for countries like Nigeria—where access to quality education remains uneven to double down on policies and investments that will close learning gaps and expand opportunities for all.

In Africa, especially Sub-Saharan Africa, the indicators are dire. The report shows a clear connection between illiteracy and countries in extreme poverty.

Similarly, a previous 2022 report by UNICEF had shown that “One in three children are out-of-school in Nigeria. This means 10.2 million at the primary level and 8.1 million at the junior secondary school (JSS) level, while 1. 12 million children never attended school and 5.9 million left school early”.

This latest report from UNESCO on the literacy rate in Africa, especially Nigeria is deeply troubling as the continent witnessed an increase in the number of out-of-school children in Africa by 12 million. Nigeria’s out-of-school population accounts for a whopping 15 percent of the global total. This is clearly outrageous and unsustainable.

While bemoaning the fall in the quality of teachers and administrators in Nigerias’ schools, a BusinessDay report on the 28th of October 2024 had indicated that education spending per child has remained flat since 2010, signaling a lack of investment. The report also claimed that in Africa, especially Nigeria, nearly as much is spent by governments on debt servicing as on education.

The situation is not helped by the constant search for new and greener pastures by teachers and educators beyond the shores of our country, thereby adding to the greatly diminished numbers of those emptying out of our education system.

The Nigeria Union of Journalists calls on governments and institutions of government to brace up for the challenge to ensure that our people are made literate through deliberate policies and investments in education as well as provide much greater incentives to educators. A new, positive chapter just has to be written on this troubling issue.