Nigeria’s capital territory is said to have surpassed the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, recommended benchmark for budgetary allocation to the education sector.
According to FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, the FCT Administration has committed a total sum of $1,045,176,470 billion, approximately N177 billion for the development of infrastructures in the education sector.
The figure, he said, was inclusive of the N3,500,000,000.00 billion counterpart funding from Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, bringing the total commitment of infrastructural development to approximately N177,000,000,000.00 billion.
The minister who disclosed this at the 6th International Conference on Learning Cities held in Jubail, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, said the budget for the development of infrastructures in the sector surpassed the UNESCO benchmark of 26 per cent of annual budget for the FCT.
The minister who was represented by the Minister of State FCT, Dr. Mariya Mahmoud, said a total of 21 primary and junior secondary schools were renovated completely, while a total of 30 senior secondary schools were also established.
A statement by the Media Adviser to the FCT Minister of State, Austine Elemue, highlighted other area of infrastructural investment to include the tertiary education sector, adding that the FCT Administration has committed the sum of N14,529,622,993 billion for the completion and launch of FCT University, Abaji.
Elemue quoted the minister as saying that, “UNESCO generally recommends that member nations have a budgetary allocation benchmark of at least 26 per cent to education.
“This benchmark is intended to ensure that countries can adequately address needs of their education system such as teachers, training, infrastructure development and educational technology.
“It might interest my audience to know that Abuja’s annual budget for education surpasses the UNESCO benchmark”.
The minister further stated that the city under his watch has invested heavily in the training and retraining of teachers and educational infrastructure in the six area councils of the territory.
Wike affirmed that the administration has maintained a total commitment to the Abuja Learning City status as emphasised by UNESCO, adding that Abuja city has adopted a “whole school” approach system that promotes peace, security, and tolerance through knowledge, skills and global awareness.
The 6th International Conference on Learning Cities, ICLC 6, focuses on strategies to promote climate action through lifelong learning. The conference’s theme is “Learning cities at the forefront of climate action”.
The conference brought together representatives from UNESCO learning cities, policy-makers, educators, researchers, and other stakeholders.
