Three Main Problems Faced by Nigeria - Essay Example

Academic skills 7 December, 2009 “Discuss the three main problems faced by Nigeria today. Suggest and evaluate possible solutions” At the beginning of this millennium, Okonkwo (p.58) had anticipated the threats that impended the Nigerian people and its government, along with the challenges that may come in way to handling these threats. From a globalization perspective, the challenge was to obtain a sustainable development of Nigeria and its people through effective educational system. Through education alone Nigeria, or any other country, can build a strong economy, educated and skilled workforce, bring peace and stability to the lives of its citizens. The last few years of the twentieth century, when the world was moving towards immense development at a global level, Nigeria was experiencing high unemployment, weak economy, abandoned and ruined educational system, high poverty, increased corruption and other malpractices in the private and public sectors, increased rates of crime, international criticism and imposed sanctions, and a bad management system. Okonkwo (p.58), along with other leaders, sociologists, and researchers advocated a strong need for a revamped and innovated educational system. Although the need for good education was recognized at the beginning of this century, or even earlier dating back to the colonial period (Ajayi, 420), researches conducted in recent times have also identified these or very similar needs. For example, Odia and Omofonmwan (p.81) have identified specific problems related to the educational system such as decline in standard, deterioration of facilities, examination malpractices, mass promotion syndrome and others. Ajibade stated, ‘Many Nigerian elites, going by the quality of their contributions to debates, are suffering from acute “intellectual malnutrition.” It is now pretty difficult to fight ignorance in Nigeria, a country which the World Bank report for 1991 says is the 13th poorest nation in the world. The per capita income of an average Nigerian hardly permits him the luxury of getting information materials. Not many Nigerians can afford the exorbitant prices of books.’ (qtd. in Ihonvbere, 73). This indicates two factors affecting the Nigerian education, firstly the standard of education and secondly, socioeconomics of the nation. In fact, academic crises and strength of sociopolitical conditions are interdependent. On similar terms, Odia and Omofonmwan (p.82) pointed out that education in the contemporary times has become the privilege of the affordable masses, and a business with great earning potential for the educationalists. Their research discovered that most of the schools in Nigeria lacked complete set of teachers, and that the teachers were not sufficiently paid. In addition, students are being charged with various kinds of dues and fees, which are not affordable to most of the students. Decline in standards of intended academic skills are also attributed to poor parental guidance, poverty, influence of alcohol and drug abuse, and distraction towards risky behaviours resulting in lack of orientation towards education for the mass adolescents. Low standards of education resulted in low representation of the previously disadvantaged people in most of the public sectors, in spite of the constitutional legislation supporting equal opportunities (John-Mary, 2). Historical factors such as racism against Black people in education in the past, lower socioeconomic status, less educational opportunities for the Blacks together resulted in lack of necessary experience and advancement into certain types of occupations including the high-end technical and managerial jobs. Here, again, gender discrimination from the past limited women from acquiring higher education and also higher and critical positions in jobs (John-Mary, 2). No matter what policies are made and documented, these historical and cultural factors seem to have taken stronger stay in educational institutions and organisations, thus making the education policies less permeable into nation’s educational development. Deterioration of facilities has been experienced in many spheres of academia like in development of revolutionary literature, in terms of recognizing the inherent talent of the nation, lack of firm ground for the intellectuals, and an inability to appreciate natural talent and skills. The African economic outlook (p.252) quoted about reports indicating that the governmental budget allocation towards basic primary and secondary education had resulted in significant increase in rate of student enrolment, from 86.6% to 91% in 2000; however, this was much lower than the budgetary outlay in other African nations. In fact, better enrolment rates were achieved after federal allocation of budgetary facilities towards primary and secondary education encompassing two-tier system of secondary education and provision of learning material and textbooks at subsidized rates (Fadayomi, 100). Pointing out at the lack of national institutional mechanisms for publicizing Nigerian creative work is very evident in the field of arts, painting, sculpture and filmmaking. Referring to the contemporary ‘Oshogbo’ art, Onoge (p.41) expresses that it was discovered by people that did not belong to the nation. Onoge (p.41) also adds, ‘in Nigeria, our painters and sculptors are discovered and presented to us by the British Council, U.S.I.S, and the German cultural centers.’ Recently, the Times (April 15,2009) reported that the visa granting officials had identified about 1000 forged documents out of 6000 student visa applications from Nigeria. These were regarded as fraud because they were not attached to any authentic and registered university or college in Nigeria. Post this discovery, the Home Office, UK, decided to list all officially registered colleges and students are required to prove their association with these listed colleges before attempting to procure an admission overseas (Ford, 15 April 2009). Omofonmwan’s work revealed other malpractices involving secondary school students’ and teachers’ transactions, in the form of cooperation fees, to clear the common examinations, caused either due to inadequate preparation or lack of appropriate facilities for the students’ preparation. Teachers aware of this fact use it as an advantage to earn extra income. The government’s response of suspending teachers involved in these illegal practices resulted in acute shortage, which again caused much more problems in schools due to lack of planning to replace these teachers. Some governments also imposed fees to students on different grounds such as religion, locality and also gender, which were highly demotivating to students and the nation in achieving their educational goals (Odia & Omofonmwan, 82). Adopting some suggestions from different researchers, (Abernethy, 191; Odia & Omofonmwan, 85; Nwagwu, 87), the main focus areas include appropriate funding, planning and management of educational services by the democratic government. Besides this, ownership of promoting right education and practices rests equally with parents, teachers, administrators, policy makers and members of the public. Elimination of discrimination can be effected through the democratically elected governments, and strong legislative policies guarding against discrimination practices must be formulated. The current crises in Nigerian education must be regarded as an extremely important area of focus, and enough time and resources must be allocated towards improvising the ‘system’ as a whole. Odia and Omofonmwan (p.85) recommend appointment of an independent committee to regularly monitor activities in schools to avoid malpractices, appropriate usage of the funds, and in achieving the required educational standards. Immense efforts would be required to influence the citizens to ensure their children are receiving the minimum required education through campaigns, advertisements, media, etc. In fact, it is even worth forcing people to send their children for education. In conclusion, the three main problems in the educational sector of Nigeria, namely, low educational standards, inappropriate facilities, and prevailing malpractices, are mainly attributed to lack of assistance in the form of budget, morality, recognition or appreciation of good talent and hard work, inappropriate facilities and management for schools and universities, and other issues such as discrimination based on race, gender, ethnocentricity etc. Influencing effects and changes can be brought about only through the governmental bodies including education ministry for development, legislation to promote antidiscrimination, punish malpractices, promote compulsory education schemes, quality certification programs etc, with special focus and attention towards educational development. Works cited Books Abernethy, David B. The political dilemma of popular education: an African case U.S.A: Stanford University Press, 1969. Fadayomi, T.O. Nigeria: Consequences for Education. In Adepoju, Aderanti’s (ed.) The Impact of structural adjustment on the population of Africa: the implications for education, health, & employment. London: James Currey Publishers, 1993. Ihonvbere, Julius Omozuanvbo. Nigeria: the politics of adjustment & democracy. U.S.A: Transaction Publishers, 1994. Okonkwo, Zephyrinus C. Cirriculum and Administrative Innovations For the Nigerian Educational System in the Twenty-First Century. In Nigeria: current issues and historical background. New York: Nova Publishers, 2002. Onoge, Omafume F. The Crisis of Consciousness in Modern African Literature: A Survey (1974). In Gugelberger, Georg M’s Marxism and African literature. U.S.A: Africa World Press, 1986. Journals Ajayi, Ade J.F. Higher Education in Nigeria. African Affairs. London. Vol. 74. Pp: 420-426, 1975. Accessed from, http://afraf.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/pdf_extract/74/297/420 Odia, L.O and S.I. Omofonmwan. Educational System in Nigeria Problems and Prospects. Journal of Social Sciences. Vol:14 No 1. pp: 81-86, 2007. Accessed from, http://www.krepublishers.com Nwagwu, Cordelia C. The Environment of Crises in the Nigerian Education System. Comparative Education. Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Vol. 33, No. 1, 1997, pp. 87-95. Accessed from, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3099568 Articles African economic outlook. France: OECD Publishing, 2002. Accessed from, http://books.google.co.in/books?id=SDMcKTvdzRkC&pg=PT253&dq=deterioration+facilities+education+nigeria#v=onepage&q=deterioration%20facilities%20education%20nigeria&f=false Ford, Richard. “Determined terrorists could subvert security checks over student visas.” The Times. TIMESONLINE. Published on April 15, 2009. Viewed December 7, 2009 from http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6094379.ece John-Mary, Kauzya. Managing Diversity in the Public Service: one of Africa’s least tackled issues: (lessons from South Africa’s experience). Presented during American Society for Public Administration, 2002, U.S.A. Accessed from. http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/UN/UNPAN002869.pdf Read More