Political Dispensation and its Effects on the Early Childhood and Primary Education in Nigeria

Dr Grace Oluremilekun Akanbi

doi:10.5296/jsr.v3i2.2485

Abstract

The importance of education to human beings cannot be overemphasized. It is seen, regarded and accepted to some extent, as the quickest way to eradicate poverty and ills in the society. There are a lot of international human rights instruments that provide for education as a fundamental right. These include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966) and the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights (1981). To this end, various nations have given priority to education and have developed mechanisms to operate the system for effective impartation and acquisition of knowledge and skills that will help the learners to be useful for themselves and to the society at large. Pre-Primary and Primary levels of education are the most crucial because they form the foundation upon which all other levels depend to thrive. It could be seen as the proverbial ‘ketekete’ (donkey - the burden bearer). However, several political dispensations had affected these levels of education in Nigeria. This paper, therefore, highlights the various political dispensations/phases of early childhood and primary education in Nigeria from 1842 to 2011. It discusses the various programmes at various dispensations, how they were developed, operated, managed, sustained and the outcome or the effects of each dispensation on the general development and quality of education in Nigeria. Some hindrances to qualitative pre-primary and primary education were also discussed. The paper also suggests among others, that education sector should be a zone for professionals. Keywords: Early Childhood, Primary and Pre-Primary Education, National Policy on Education (NPE), Political dispensation, Universal Basic Education

Highlights

Before the introduction of Islamic and Western education as rightly observed by the Federal Ministry of Education (2007), every community in Nigeria had its traditional pattern of education that ensured socialization and intergenerational transmission of cultural heritage.With the coming of Islam, parts of the country assimilated Islamic education into their indigenous systems and developed highly sophisticated and organized literacy civilization
Human beings are generally referred to as political animals, society cannot be devoid of politics but it should be played for the progress of the society, especially as it touches sensitive sectors such as education
The state of pre-primary and primary education in Nigeria could be attributed to the poor politics that had been played and is being played

Summary

Introduction

Before the introduction of Islamic and Western education as rightly observed by the Federal Ministry of Education (2007), every community in Nigeria had its traditional pattern of education that ensured socialization and intergenerational transmission of cultural heritage. The Education Sector Analysis (ESA) studies on pre-primary education provides a clear picture of provisions for early childhood care and development in Nigeria as shown in table 1 below. The UBE programme is a reform measure which is aimed at addressing inequality in educational opportunity and addressing the distortion in the basic education sub-sector It reinforces the implementation of the National Policy on Education and ensures access, equity and quality of basic education throughout the country, especially at the pre-primary and primary levels. According to the National Policy for Integrated Early Childhood Development in Nigeria (2007), 30% of 6-11 year old children are not in school and the Report of the Vision 2020 National Technical Working Group on Education Sector (2009), the rate of access to primary education for the six geo-political zones were South-West 88.0%; North-central 79.7% and. UBEC (2010) in its report on the utilization of the UBE Intervention and Counterpart Funds in 36 States and FCT gave the following; (An extract is presented in the table below and we must ask ourselves; out of how many or what percentage?)

Teacher professional development

Findings

Conclusion and Recommendations