With the rising numbers of uneducated Nigerians, former President Olusegun Obasanjo on Tuesday raised concerns over the growing numbers of out-of-school children saying if not properly addressed the children may become future terrorists.
According to him, Nigeria must ensure that the 20 million out-of-school children are educated or the country risks the creation of another set of Boko Haram terrorists in the future.
Obasanjo raised the concerns at the National Summit on Tertiary Education Reform organised by the Office of the Speaker of the House of Representatives in Abuja on Tuesday.
He said, “What are the issues? The issue, to me, is that we are cutting more than we can chew. Who is looking at our population ahead of time, five years from now, 10 years from now? What can we do about it? Apart from food, which is very important – food production, food security, nutrition security – who are the people thinking about that and working forward to that? The third important aspect of our life is education, after food and health.
“Now, if this is the position and these are rights that we must have – right to food security, right to health and right to education – what do we do? We know that if we continue the way we are going, by the year 2030, 2040, 2050 what our population will be; could it be that we won’t think about what our population will be and how we will sort it out?
“Where did we miss the road? We missed the road when the whole world was talking of education for all and we did not follow that. It was a bad miss. Education for all! We even had a target date globally. We, today, out of the 244 million children out of school, we have 20 million – almost 10 per cent. We miss, we continue to miss and we are missing. That is a very bad one.
“Can we do anything about it? I believe we can. Those 20 million children that are out of school, we can get them back to school. If we don’t get them back to school, we are preparing for Boko Haram of tomorrow and nobody needs to tell you anything about that. It will happen. As sure as daylight, it will happen.
“What can we do? Where are these 20 million children? Where are they located? Can we have school in the morning and in the afternoon to get them in at least for six years? In the period of six years when this is happening, we will prepare for the transition from primary school to secondary school. And if we are able to do that, we have started use education as an instrument of nation building.”
