Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), says Nigeria must align its education system with the country’s development priorities to build a productive economy and achieve sustainable national growth.
In a tweet on Thursday titled ‘Roadmap to a New Nigeria That
Is Possible’, Obi identified education and healthcare as the twin pillars upon
which the country’s renewal must be anchored.
The former Anambra governor said no nation could achieve
lasting prosperity without investing in quality education and accessible
healthcare, adding that both sectors remain critical to developing the human
capital needed for economic transformation.
Recalling the first part of his roadmap released on July 1,
Obi said he had proposed rebuilding Nigeria through investments in education,
healthcare, technical and vocational education, character development and civic
education to shift the country from a consumption-driven economy to one powered
by production.
He said the latest intervention was intended to elaborate on
what he described as two of the most important foundations for national
development.
“Today, July 16th, in the middle of July, I wish to expand
on these two critical pillars — education and healthcare — because they are the
bedrock upon which every prosperous nation is built,” he said.
“They are the cornerstones of the foundation that will
ensure that a son of nobody can become somebody and remove many from the ranks
of the disaffected who often become tools in the insecurity challenges
confronting us.”
Obi cited global evidence to support his position,
referencing Nobel Prize-winning economist Angus Deaton’s work on the
relationship between health, education and national prosperity.
He also dismissed the growing sentiment among some young
Nigerians that education has lost its value.
“Nothing, therefore, could be further from the truth than
the claim by some young people that ‘education is a scam’. Education, when
combined with good health, provides the ladder for individual upward mobility
and drives economic growth for the nation,” he said.
The politician said Nigeria must deliberately restructure
its education system to reflect its economic priorities, drawing lessons from
countries such as Singapore and China.
“We must become more intentional about aligning education
with our national priorities, as Singapore did, and challenge our country to
value education in the same way Deng Xiaoping repeatedly urged China to do from
1978 onwards, with the remarkable transformation we see today,” he said.
Obi proposed greater collaboration among the three tiers of
government to improve education delivery, saying primary education should be
managed at the community and local government levels with stronger parental
participation.
He added that curricula should reflect local economic
realities and support value chains within communities.
The former governor also pledged support for state
governments to expand access to quality secondary education and technical and
vocational education through targeted grants and incentives.
He said plans were also underway to reposition universities
to focus on specialised teaching and research, enabling them to compete
globally while producing graduates equipped for the future.
“We are also developing schemes that will enable
universities to focus more deliberately on specialised areas of teaching and
research, making them globally competitive while producing a workforce equipped
for the demands of the future,” Obi said.
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