Illiteracy is a major impediment to development in Nigeria. Sadly, over the years, the percentage of illiterates in the country has been on a steady increase due to the strange attitude of the government towards education.Indeed, the government has to ensure the provision of compulsory and universal primary, secondary, and university education including adult literacy programs. However, successive administrations in Nigeria have failed in this respect.
In this interview, the Founder, Spiritual Head, and Gran Imam of Shafuadeen-in-Islam Worldwide, Prof. Sabitu Olagoke opines that the steady increase in the number of illiterates is a threat to society. Excerpts :
How do you think the Government can stem the increase in the number of illiterates in the country?
Illiteracy is a relative term with respect to the types of education which an individual does not have access to. For example, one's inability to read through the Arabic language to be able to practice the Islamic religion could be regarded as a state of been illiterate in this respect, while the lettered ones could be regarded as literate.
In Nigeria, we have adopted the English language as our lingua franca and as a tool through which western education is taught, assimilated, and practiced. Certification follows in the area of the cognitive domain of education to be rated as been scholarly in society. Based on this, Nigeria can be rated as been literate or illiterate.
Education, generally, is expected to build human character as well as reforming the animal called man. Our attitude and capacity level to handle issues within the scope of our areas of jurisdiction and specialization determines the types of certificates an individual receives, the work level one can effectively cope with, and the expected contribution from one on the issue of community service and national development. In 2010, Nigeria recorded 10.5 million out-of-school children and it increased to 12.5 million in 2015 and 13.9 million in 2018.
The various situations of banditry, terrorism, and other violent crimes increased the figure to about 15 million, for the following reasons which are yet to be addressed. Underfunignof education which has always been usually below 10 percent of the annual national budget as against the minimum benchmark of 26 percent of the national budget as rational allocation to education per nation. The refusal of the Almajiri system of Arabic education which has been made for long to be hostile to the acquisition of western education is another factor that is contributing immensely to the increasing number of illiterates. The predicament of the Internally Displaced Persons(IDP) is also a factor.
Schooling for education looks very much a waste of time to people who are already hopeless with nobody, Fathers, or Mothers including Governments that have no provisions for them.
The inability to read and write creates an environment of ignorance with a consequent barbaric attitude towards societal development. Such people will lack the necessary capacity to contribute and the much-needed understanding to be friendly to the society.
With the number of illiterates on the increase in society, there is a high possibility of building a culture of threats to the society whereby safety and security would be sacrificed for the polity to be heated into a chaotic situation which presently characterizes the practice of democracy.
There is the case of educated illiterates, who though can read and write, cannot perform when given assignments or tasks because they lack the ability to comprehend and process information.
Such people are graduates who lack the ambassadorial qualities of their alma mater vis-a-vis positive self-image, confidence, self-esteem, and the positive mental attitude to do things the right way.
The situation on the ground in Nigeria is so bad, that informal education from the home cannot impart the basic necessary native intelligence. The spiritual education from the houses of God cannot produce worthy, reliable, and dependable graduates, whose activities are expected to promote sanity in their places of work. A number of graduates of education inflict injuries on the people, disrupt the system, and see their positions as an avenue for self-enrichment rather than sacrifice. The only solution today is to overhaul the whole process of our educational management of the people by reforming their attitude to suit the target of development and friendly interactions.
Education, therefore, must culturally be regarded as fundamental to human needs and development as a luxury, but as an inalienable right of every child as established by UNICEF.
Education must be processed to nurture the nature of our youths towards leadership essence by practical training that would compel them to be conscious of the huge assignments before them, in the preservation of the heritage of our heroes and heroines and the determination to write their names in the sands of time and in gold, on the issues of peace and sustainable development.
When the foundation of education is made to be strong enough in terms of functionality, the issue of illiteracy must be squarely addressed by ensuring that no child is out on the streets begging for alms or hawking petty things, so also adult education , must be well funded and established to be able to meet up with the United Nations Declaration on Education for All.
If Nigeria is able to have a breakthrough in respecting the international instruments to be domesticated in realizing functional and all-encompassing education, there is a high probability for us to realize maximum achievement in the area of the 17 point agenda of sustainable development goals.
Education is not a luxury, but a right that must be given adequate attention by the government, international donors, and philanthropists in the land to eradicate in all its entirety illiteracy amidst us.
