One of Nigeria’s former presidents, Olusegun Obasanjo, has said that 20 million out-of-school children across Nigeria are a disaster waiting to happen.
Premium Times reports that Obasanjo while speaking at the National Summit on Tertiary Education Reform organized by the leadership of the House of Representatives on Tuesday, November 22, said the out-of-school risk has the potential to become 20 million Boko Haram members.
The summit was conceived to provide answers to the incessant industrial actions by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) hindering education across the country.
Delivering his speech, Obasanjo said that the government at all levels must seek solutions to reduce the number of out-of-school children.
He also warned that Nigeria has missed the SDG target of reducing the out-of-children which has become a menace to society.
The former president emphasizes the need to improve primary and secondary education in the country.
His words:
“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. Today, out of the 244 million children out of school, we have 20 million – almost 10 percent. We continue to miss and we are missing. That is a very bad one.
“They cannot be part of nation building because they have not had the opportunity to develop their innate capacity to the extent that they can be useful to themselves, to their family, and their community, let alone the nation.”
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