By Tony Edike
ENUGU—The Federal Government has expressed serious concern over the poor completion rates of primary school pupils in the country, just as it put current school enrolment at 90 percent.

Permanent Secretary, State House Abuja, Dr. Ibrahim Daudu, disclosed this during a training workshop and induction for Technical Assistants and Zonal Technical Officers organized by the Office of the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Millennium Development Goals, MDGs.

He said though net school enrolment rate had reached almost 90 per cent from just 68 per cent in 1990, one of the major challenges that had persisted was “providing the quality teaching and learning environment to turn around primary completion rates.”

Daudu also disclosed that access to water and sanitation remained stubbornly low,’ and explained that up-to-date information on poverty rates was expected to be available in the near future to provide a major indication of the government’s success in linking economic growth to poverty reduction and employment generation.

He pointed out that the induction and workshop for MDGs Technical Assistants was a consequence of a series of successful investments that Nigeria had made over the past decade in poverty reduction and achievement of the MDGs.

According to him, the MDGs Report 2010 has provided updated data on the MDGs indicators that would allow Nigeria to tell a compelling story about her progress as unprecedented progress has been made on some indicators.

He disclosed that the most powerful tool that has been discovered in its performance of the past six years is that of partnership, which is embodied in the flagship Conditional Grants Scheme.CGS, Initiative and the scheme was introduced in response to the low rates of implementation and sustainability of MDGs projects being achieved at the federal level.

The Permanent Secretary emphasized that since the experience of poverty is at the local level “this is where the investment is required, besides the constitutional responsibility for primary services such as healthcare, education and water supply which cover the MGDs Goals rest at the state and local government levels.

Explaining that the Conditional Grants Scheme provides a window for states and local government to scale up investment in the MDGs, the Permanent Secretary noted that by channeling funds through state governments, there was an opportunity to build capacity and develop systems of service delivery.

He added that the objective of extending the engagement from the states to local government is to create a truly inclusive and sustainable approach to service delivery and the MDGs.

“There is no institution better placed to deliver appropriate and quality services to communities and accelerate progress towards achievement of the MDGs than the local government because this tier of government is the closest to the people and can most effectively respond to their needs and priorities,” Daudu said.

Declaring the workshop open, Enugu State Governor Sullivan Chime described the recruitment of the Technical Assistants and Zonal Technical Assistants as timely, adding that it was a positive development which would provide a good opportunity to take the crusade for taking the MDGs down to the third-tier of government.

Chime observed that this would not only support government effort to decentralize and institutionalize project planning, implementation and monitoring at the local government level but would also strengthen a very strong partnership among all the tiers of government towards a collective effort to meet the goals of MDGs.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2011/07/fg-laments-high-rate-of-primary-school-drop-outs/