South East States Fail To Access UBEC Fund – Executive Secretary

The executive secretary, Universal Basic Education Commission
(UBEC), Dr Hamid Boboyyi has lamented that despite the poor funding
of education sector, many states are unable to access the Universal
Basic Education Commission’s intervention fund, with South-East and
South-South states most affected.

Boboyyi said this during an interactive section with journalists
in his office in Abuja yesterday.

While saying that it is worrisome from 2013 till date, there are
still outstanding funds, he said in the South-West zone, there is a
lot of problems as the outstanding amount reach over N9billion in
2015 and over N1billion in 2016.

According to him, in the south-east zone, there are also
problems.

Enugu from 2013, Ebonyi 2014 and Abia have not accessed their
funds despite demand for them to do so. This is just as he urged
other states yet to access their funds to try and do so.

He also raised the alarm over the federal government’s pushing
for the reduction of counterpart funding saying that if it is
reduced, the states will suffer it more.

“If you take the entire amount that is budgeted for UBEC and
want to do one thing, may be infrastructure, it may take you more
than five years or so to be able to constitute 10 per cent of the
needs of the states.”

The UBEC boss further stressed the need for strategic plan of
the basic education, saying that strategic plan can be responsive
to the needs of education sector.

“There is need for us to plan and have a very precise idea of
those strategic areas that will help us tackle and build the kind
of foundation we need.

“I am also very happy to say that by the end of September, we
are going to have a national basic education sector plan that can
move the basic education sector forward,” he added.

The executive secretary, Universal Basic Education Commission
(UBEC), Dr Hamid Boboyyi has lamented that despite the poor funding
of education sector, many states are unable to access the Universal
Basic Education Commission’s intervention fund, with South-East and
South-South states most affected.

Boboyyi said this during an interactive section with journalists
in his office in Abuja yesterday.

While saying that it is worrisome from 2013 till date, there are
still outstanding funds, he said in the South-West zone, there is a
lot of problems as the outstanding amount reach over N9billion in
2015 and over N1billion in 2016.

According to him, in the south-east zone, there are also
problems.

Enugu from 2013, Ebonyi 2014 and Abia have not accessed their
funds despite demand for them to do so. This is just as he urged
other states yet to access their funds to try and do so.

He also raised the alarm over the federal government’s pushing
for the reduction of counterpart funding saying that if it is
reduced, the states will suffer it more.

“If you take the entire amount that is budgeted for UBEC and
want to do one thing, may be infrastructure, it may take you more
than five years or so to be able to constitute 10 per cent of the
needs of the states.”

The UBEC boss further stressed the need for strategic plan of
the basic education, saying that strategic plan can be responsive
to the needs of education sector.

“There is need for us to plan and have a very precise idea of
those strategic areas that will help us tackle and build the kind
of foundation we need.

“I am also very happy to say that by the end of September, we
are going to have a national basic education sector plan that can
move the basic education sector forward,” he added.