Kano, Kebbi two other northwestern states fail to access N4.7 billion UBEC funds despite 4.8 million out of school children

By solacebase.com On Aug 18, 2024

Kano, Kebbi , northwestern states, UBEC funds, school children — Kano, Kebbi two other northwestern states fail to access N4.7 billion UBEC funds despite 4.8 million out of school children

By Aminu Abubakar

Data published by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) has shown that four Northwestern states, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina and Kebbi, jointly failed to access N4.7 billion UBEC funds in 2023.

The most recent data published by UBEC shows that Kaduna failed to access N1.39 billion, Kano N581.5 million, Katsina N1.39 billion and Kebbi N1.39 billion.

This development is despite the fact that access to education by children of school age, which the UBEC fund aims to address, is a major challenge.

SolaceBase reports that in Kaduna, 29% of children of school age are deprived access to school attendance, the figure stands at 35% in Kano, 38% in Katsina while the percentage in Kebbi stands at 45% per data from the National Bureau of Statistics multidimensional poverty index.

Data published by data curation platform, Statisense shows that the four states jointly have 4.8 million children who are out of school. The figure in Kano is estimated at 1.890 million, Katsina stands at 1.4 million, Kebbi at 1.060 million and Kaduna at 660,000.

These states are expected to provide a matching grant in order to access the UBEC grant, but they failed to do so.

Most recent data accessed by SolaceBase also paints a grim picture.

In 2024, Katsina budgeted N2.9 billion for its Universal Basic Education Board capital expenditure but failed to spend any money in the first six months of 2024 on this purpose; that is the state recorded 0% budget performance, per details on the officially released budget performance document of the state.

Kano state budgeted N10.5 billion for its state universal basic education fund need but only spent N581 million in the first six months of the 2024 fiscal year per details on the budget performance documents of the state.

Access to education and poor state of schools have been identified as a major challenge in Northwestern Nigeria states.

For instance, in June 2024, the Kano state governor, Abba Yusuf lamented that over 4.7 million pupils are forced to sit on bare floors to learn, painting a dire need for intervention in schools. Despite words, data shows that Kano for instance is not putting money to back up solutions to its complaints, as actual budgetary expenditure to budget remains low.

Poor education has also been labelled as having a huge impact of growth of poverty and poor economic indices in the Northern region of the country.

Despite many promises to ensure that there is better access to education and its equitable distribution, this continues to remain a myriad, as data questions the commitment of these states to ensuring the availability of education and educational facilities, especially at the grassroots level.