The presidential candidate of the Action Democratic Party (ADP), Yabagi Sani has pledged to tackle the menace of out-of-school children in Nigeria and build global partnerships for the development of education, if elected president in the forthcoming presidential elections.
He stated this at a forum organised by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.
Sani, who doubles as the National Chairman, Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC) said that the best way to solve the problem of out-of-school children and improve on healthcare delivery facilities and infrastructure development was by growing the economy.
He said, “If the case of children being out of school is not a crime already in this country, it is going to be a crime under our administration. If you have a child and you do not take the child to school you are going to go to jail because you are one of the enemies of the state. You are creating criminals.”
Sani said that he would also ensure that there was enough revenue accruable to the federation account to make sure it is appropriated adequately to fund education.
He added, “If you can’t give, at least let us be able to meet the UNESCO standard which says that a nation should give 22 per cent of its annual budget to education. Our government will ensure that the minimum allocation will not be below that recommendation.
“People have come together and said that if you really want to develop education and knowing fully well that an educated nation is a progressive nation.
“If you don’t give education to a people, if you want to bring a country down to its knees, attack its education, attack its food production system, then you have that country on its knees.”
The presidential candidate who bemoaned the perennial strike by Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) said that he would tackle the action squarely.”
Sani attributed the recurring strikes to lack of leadership, saying that good leadership should have ensured there was no strike.
“What we are losing to corruption is much more than enough to fund education,” the chairman said.
On the rising number of higher institutions in the country, Sani said that it was advantageous to have many universities. He said that it was the responsibility of the government to make education available for its citizens.
Sani added, “education is supposed to be available to all and the work of government is to create an enabling environment for businesses and for the private sector to come into education and fund, operate and make it functional. All countries that progress do so as a result of the rising number of institutions.
“We will do it in such a way that not only Nigerians will build universities but other nationals will find it attractive to come and build universities here. Because, we have a huge population that requires education, functional, quality education. Create an enabling environment so that people will come, we will not reduce the number of universities we aspire for more.
Sani also said that he would give priority to women because they possess traits that would benefit his administration.
He continued: “I believe in the saying that ‘if you want it done, give it to a woman’.
“It is so unfortunate that because of cultural barriers and traditions women are relegated to the background. However, women are becoming more aggressive. Women definitely are going to be given a choice of place in the sense that they have some unique contributions.
NAN
