THE Executive Secretary of Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) Dr. Hamid Bobboyi said the commission has earmarked the sum of N2 billion for the conduct of its 2022 National Personnel Audit (NPA) even as he said the absence of credible data in basic education had impeded implementation of programmes of the sector for a long time.
Dr Bobboyi, who spoke at a media briefing in Abuja, Tuesday explained that the 2022 personnel audit was aimed at updating the basic education database.
Bobboyi said the 2022 NPA will be in two phases, and the first face had already begun in 17 states of the country, specifically in South-East and South-south.
He further disclosed that the northern phase covering 19 states and the Federal Capital Territory will begin on July 4, and ends on July 23, 2022.
Dr. Bobboyi said during the exercise, enumerators will visit all basic education institutions in the country, the public, private, approved, unapproved, registered and unregistered will all be visited.
”They are going to collect basic information on schools and personnel,” he said.
He stressed that data being collected will assist the country to plan effectively towards expansion of access to quality education and promoting gender parity at basic and other levels of education.
”On the 2022 NPA, the commission is in partnership with relevant government agencies, development partners and NGOs , National Bureau of Statistics, National Population Commission, Nigeria Air Space Research and Development Agency, NUT, Association of private school owners , the World Bank, UNICEF among others,” he said.
Earlier, the Chairman of the 2022 NPA, Prof. Bala Zakari, said the Commission had generated a list of basic schools in each local government areas from State Universal Basic Education to address issues of hard-to-reach areas and places facing security challenges.
“We must acknowledge that there is no area where human activity can be 100 per cent perfect”, Prof. Zakari said.
He said any denial of 2022 NPA teams access to schools will further contribute to the increasing number of out-of-school children.
“The NPA exercise is out to ensure that all existing learning centres are counted along with available facilities in the schools. We believe it will help partners in their intervention plans and will serve as database for the basic education institutions in Nigeria,” he said.
Similar exercise was conducted in 2018 covering public and private institutions, unlike in 2006 and 2010 that were limited to only public schools.
