Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, has called for more investment in the education sector.
The presidential hopeful said this while sharing his agenda for the education sector if elected in the 2023 election at a town hall meeting organised for presidential candidates by Arise TV, The Punch reported.
Peter Obi spoke alongside other frontline presidential candidates in the 2023 race, which included Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) Rabiu Kwankwaso.
The former governor of Anambra state added that the federal government needed to revisit its agreement with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and strategies on sustainable funding mechanisms.
While lamenting poor investment in Nigeria’s education sector, Obi said a comparable country like South Africa, which is the second-biggest economy in Africa, has a better investment in education than Nigeria.
He said Nigeria needs to restructure its funding of tertiary institutions. He urged the government to allow private sector participation in the funding mechanism.
His statement reads in part:
“All they need now is to go back to the agreement, clear the backlog and then design a sustainable funding mechanism. It is very easy, we learn from what is happening in other countries of the world.”
