Budget: Don urges FG to allocate 10 per cent to education

The former Vice Chancellor of Benue State University (BSU) Makurdi, Professor David Ker has called on the federal government to assign 10 per cent of the nation’s annual budget to education sector.
Prof. Ker made this appeal at the 7th national conference organised by Faculty of Administration, Nasarawa State University Keffi, (NSUK).
He said government should resist paying lip-service on education year in year out.
The former commissioner of education in Benue state who spoke on the topic, “Rethinking leadership and governance in Nigeria”, stressed that building institutions and service delivery both in private and public sectors is important to nation building.
He lamented that Nigeria has failed in the area of leadership but deliberately does not search for what went wrong.
He then scholar sited an example of leadership challenges in Nigeria using a novel published in Ghana in 1968 entitled, “Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born”.
He frowned at the manner government is ignoring education, a sector which is the brain behind every development in any country in the world.
Ker maintained that Nigeria cannot develop by given education annual budget allocation less than 8 per cent.
He opined that Nigeria has to focus on education tap the human resources of its own people.
“Nigeria should become a developed country with a developed capacity,” he said.
Similarly, the chairman of the occasion who doubled as the pro chancellor of the university, HRH Emir of Keffi, Dr.
Shehu Chindo Yamusa III, described the conference as timely as it was designed to proffer solutions to issues that have to do with labour management, noting that economic practices in traditional African society can be enhanced specifically in the six geopolitical zones of the country.
The emir said that Nigeria as a nation was surviving on debts which is affecting its economic growth, saying the threat requires academic researches.
He further urged government to provide grants to women for self-reliance, which will assist in improving the nation’s GDP.
The former NSUK lecturer proposes that government should support all Nigerian lecturers in the area of research rather than allowing them using their personal resources in attending conferences.
Speaking on the seventh national conference with the theme, “Managing National Economic Recovery (NER)”, the Speaker of House Yakubu Dogara defined managing as administration and use of limited resources, forecasting, planning, leadership, and exceptional skills to achieve predetermined specific goal, while economy is a system of distribution and consumption, while recovery is a return to normal health or status.
The speaker who was represented by Hon Jonathan Gaza Gbefwi stressed that Nigeria has designed an Economy Recovery Growth Programme (ERGP) to tackle the future economic challenges between year 2017 and year 2020.
He however, expressed worry over poor implementation of government initiatives designed to improve the life of citizens.
On his part, the vice chancellor of

‘Over 11,000 Nigerian students in the US’

The United States Consul General F. John Bray has said that there are 11,710 Nigerian students currently studying the United States of America.
Bray said this in Lagos during the pre-departure orientation for Nigerian students going to the U.S to further their education.
The Consular General said the number of Nigerian students in the United States has been increasing for seven years, adding UCH endorses Hijab for nursing students

The University College (UCH), Ibadan, Oyo state, has approved the wearing of Hijab for its nursing students.
This approval came after the minister of health, Prof.
Isacc Adewole approved the report of the ad hoc committee on standardisation of the use of Hijab on school uniform in the schools of nursing, having noted that its recommendations were in line with the standards of the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria.
The hospital in a statement issued by A.
K. Shinyabola, its director of administration, advised students who want to embrace their religion in fulfillment of the religious belief to do so in strict compliance with the approved standard.
Shinyanbola in the circular dated Friday, July13, 2018, issued on behalf of the hospital’s Chief Medical Director, Prof.
Temitope Alonge and addressed to all heads of department, directed all concerned departments to comply with the new rule.
Note that a UniLorin law graduate, Miss Firdaus Amasa, was on Tuesday called to bar six months after she was denied such opportunity on account of her insistence to wear Hijab in the bar ceremony.
She was called to the bar in Abuja, the nation’s capital along with other new lawyers.

that the 11,710 students in the US represent a 9.7 per cent increase.
Breaking it down, Bray said of the 11, 710 students, ‘’49.5 per cent are undergraduate; 36.2 per cent are students, 2 per cent are non-degree candidates, and the remaining 12.3 per bcent are on Optional Practical Training.
”Students from Nigeria attend about 800 institutions in each of our 50 states.
The most popular state is Texas, with 1,540 students, while the most popular college/university is Houston Community College, with 220 students’’.
Bray, however, praised Nigerians for placing value on education adding that the number of Nigerian students in the US increases because they place value on education.
”One major reason for the increase of Nigerian students in the U.S.
is the value that Nigerians place on quality education.
”I am pleased to say that accredited U.S.
colleges and universities provide a quality education.
”Whether you are interested in a large school or small school, a school in a rural or urban setting or you want to study in a hot or cold climate, the United States has a school for you,” he said.
The Consular General, therefore, advised all students to represent Nigeria in the best possible light adding that they might be the only Nigerians many Americans would meet.

 

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