Niger State Governor, Hon. Mohammed Umaru Bago, has disclosed that his administration has within the shortest time paid over four billion naira as counterpart funds for various educational programmes in the state.
The governor, who was represented by his deputy, Comrade Yakubu Garba, made this disclosure at the 2023 World Teachers Day celebration, organised by the state wing of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), held at Teachers House, Minna, on Thursday.
He said that the state has no outstanding funds with respect to counterpart funds for education programmes and projects in the state.
The governor also revealed that their efforts had started yielding positive results as the state had started accessing some of the funds for educational development purposes in the state.
He observed that Niger State had been left behind in terms of development in all sectors of the state, including education, because of our nonchalant attitudes towards anything owned by the government and called for general attitudinal change for the growth and development of the state.
He explained that the fact that teachers need an improved salary does not mean that they should not give their best towards teaching and learning, adding that this attitude needs to be changed to provide quality educational services.
He added that the present administration in the state is determined to move the education sector forward, but that it can only succeed if they are on the same page with all stakeholders in the sector, particularly the major actors, who are the teachers.
The governor added that they will look into the demands of the teachers with a view to taking care of them one at a time, particularly the issue of enhancing salaries for teachers.
In her address, the state commissioner for basic and secondary education, who was the Chief Guest of Honour at the occasion, Dr. Hadiza Asabe Mohammed, disclosed that the state governor had given the ministry a matching order to unravel the factors militating against effective delivery of quality education in the state, including teacher shortage and welfare.
While congratulating the teachers, pupils, students, and parents on the occasion of the 2023 World Teachers Day celebration, the Commissioner also urged the teachers to keep hope alive as the present administration, under the leadership of Governor Umar Bago, was committed to building a new Niger State.
Delivering a keynote address on the topic "The Teachers We Need for the Education We Want: The Global Imperative to Reverse Teacher Shortages," the keynote speaker, Ustaz Yabagi Alfa, observed that teachers were very important to the Nigerian educational system and nation-building.
He said teachers were the heart of the education system, saying that with good structures and educational facilities, if we don't have good teachers, it amounts to nothing, but that a competent, motivated teacher can produce a future leader even under the shade of a tree.
Ustaz Yabagi added that with the right education and the teacher we need, we will have a better education for future generations, thereby advocating for a better welfare package for teachers by improving their renumerations, training, and retraining programmes among other welfare packages.