10 REASONS STUDENTS ARE PETITIONING CANDIDATES FOR DETAILED EDUCATION MANIFESTOS.
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Students of Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education in Nigeria constitute over 40% of Education Stakeholders that have so far signed the online petition launched by the Joint Education Stakeholders Action Coalition (JESAC) on 14th October 2022 calling on Candidates to provide details of their proposed education reform initiatives.
The petition was necessitated by the fact that the Education Manifestos so far released by Candidates for Presidential, Gubernatorial, Senatorial, House of Representatives and State Houses of Assembly provide no specific policies and programmes for addressing specific aspects of the challenges in education which require clear, bold, courageous, visionary, strategic, and out-of-the-box actions plans. Instead they hide behind scant generalizations.
The ten most cited problems for which Students are asking Candidates to provide their detailed plans for addressing them include:
1. STRIKES
What are the specific proposals for ending or facilitating the ending of incessant strike actions, shutting down of institutions and disruption of academic activities in education so that Students can graduate within stipulated course durations instead of wasting the most productive periods of their lives as victims of corruption, incompetence and power plays.
2. EXTORTION
How can the cost of education be reduced for students by eliminating or facilitating the elimination of extortion of money from students through all sorts of levies, scams and rackets including clearance levies, padded exam fees, scratch card levies, building levies, development levies, assessment levies, handout rackets, missing script scams, result reconciliation scams, etc.
3. CULTISM
What are the plans for ending campus cultism which has elevated challenges facing students to new and dangerous dimensions; turning campuses into virtual war zones; destroying lives; disrupting academic activities; and fuelling examination malpractice. Research indicate that over 40 different campus cult groups with over 12,000 chapters are operating in campuses of tertiary institutions across Nigeria. Over 100 students and other stakeholders are killed each year while over 10,000 students suffer harassment, intimidation, blackmail, torture, kidnapping, extortion, rape or injury as direct and collateral victims of campus cultism each year. More alarming is the fact that campus cultism is now fast spreading from tertiary institutions to primary and secondary schools
4. SEX-FOR-GRADE
The fact that sexual abuse of students is now regarded by lecturers as one of their fringe benefits in Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education is a well-reported open secret. Sex-for-Grade is flourishing as students are being blackmailed, forced and intimidated by sexual demands as conditions for awarding of pass marks or even degrees. How will the Candidates save students from this ordeal if they win.
5. SAFE SCHOOL
Besides ending cultism and sexual harassment, what are the specific plans for making schools safer in an increasingly complex environment of insecurity complicated by kidnappings, terrorism, insurgency, militancy, abductions, hostage-taking, drug abuse, fire outbreaks, cybercrimes, flood, medical other natural and man-made emergencies
6. LECTURE HALLS
What are the specific action plans for providing sufficient lecture halls especially in public tertiary institutions? In some institutions, over 1000 students are packed in lecture halls meant for 100 with many peeping through windows and many others sitting on bare floors.
7. HOSTELS
What are the specific plans for providing student hostels? Right now, 95% of students are forced by lack of hostel facilities to live in “student villages” scattered around campuses where they are susceptible to extraneous and violence influences including drugs, prostitution, rape, robbery and cultism. The 5% that live in hostels are packed like sardines in tiny improvised rodent-infested “hostels” (converted laundry and common rooms) with no lavatory facilities. In some institutions, female students are forced to take their baths in the open.
8. LABORATORIES
After the ordeal of “alternative-to-practical” for sciences lessons and exams in basic and secondary schools because of lack of re-agents, students arrive tertiary institutions to be confronted again with the phenomenon of “Dry Labs” for science courses in tertiary institutions because of lack of re-agents. What is the plan for stopping this anomaly?
9. LIBRARIES
What pass as libraries in many institutions are archaic, outdated and comatose “library facilities” with no books. What is the agenda for replacing this with automated libraries subscribed to major global knowledge gateways?
10. BAN OF FOREIGN OR PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES.
Are candidates willing to commit to their children attending public basic, secondary and tertiary institutions and to a self-imposed ban on sending their children to foreign and private institutions.
In addition to providing details of their education reform plans, Students also require Candidates to sign off on their education reform manifestos to provide assurance that their manifestos are not just election period political gimmicks for winning over education votes as has been the case in the past.
The Manifestos will be subjected to empirical assessment using the JESAC Education Manifesto Diagnostic Instrument to identify Education-Friendly Candidates that qualify for support and votes of over 30 million Education Stakeholders that include students, staff and parents.
The result of the assessment of education manifestos of Candidates for Presidential, Gubernatorial, Senatorial, House of Representatives and State Houses of Assembly will be announced at the 4th JESAC National Education Manifesto Diagnostic Conference of Education Leaders and Candidates* scheduled to hold Green Minds Hotel, Abuja from 14th to 15th December, 2022 on the theme “Education Manifesto Contract”.
Rescue of Education is a challenge of collective responsibility of all education-friendly political leaders at all levels of public office. Concerned students in all Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of Education are therefore encouraged to join in signing the petition and in mobilizing support and vote for education-friendly Presidential, Gubernatorial, Senatorial, House of Representatives and State Houses of Assembly candidates for 2023 general elections.
The link for signing the petition is
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Ike Onyechere, MFR.
Convener/National Coordinator, JESAC.
Chairman, Exam Ethics Marshals International.
Tel: +234 803 342 5958. +234 708 123 3547
Mail: examethicsmarshals2014@gmail.com
