Over 50 per cent of basic school teachers in Sokoto State cannot read and write, the Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Mohammed Modibbo, has said.
Modibbo revealed this when the Senate Committee on Education visited him at UBEC headquarters, in Abuja.
He told the senators why efforts being made by the commission to intervene in basic education in the state have not worked well.
For example, I have told you that 80 per cent of the teachers in Sokoto State cannot read,” he said. “I have given them UBE books in Sokoto State. But more than 50 per cent of the entire teachers in the state cannot read, because they are unqualified. So how can they read the UBE books we sent to them? How would they be able to teach the children how to read and impact on the children so that we can record success with our objective?”
The UBEC boss solicited for more concerted efforts by all stakeholders to achieve any meaningful results from the various intervention efforts by the government.
He also asked the senators to amend the law establishing the commission give it more powers.
“If through legislation UBEC is empowered to close any sub-standard school, it will go a long way to solving the problem,” he said. “There are so many ramshackle schools in Nigeria. People open garages and call them schools, and parents take them there.
If we have power to close them, if we have power to sanction any state that is employing unqualified teachers, it would go a long way in helping the children.”