Governor Alex Otti‘s radical transformation of the education sector has drawn the admiration and support of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).
The Head of Office and Country Representative of UNESCO to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Dr Jean-Paul Ngome-Abiaga, acknowledged Abia government’s far-reaching efforts in education, from recruitment of qualified teachers and infrastructure upgrade, when he visited Governor Otti.
“Your Excellency, let me first commend you for the work you have started since 2023. We have seen the results. I have been in this country for three and a half months, but I know the effort that was put in place here in terms of infrastructure development, fiscal discipline and also in education.
“I will speak only about education. Even though UNESCO is about education, science, culture, communication and information, we are doing so much.
But, I would like to emphasise that, Your Excellency, we know the importance and place of education in your agenda.
“We know that you have dedicated 20% of the budget of the State to education, and we would like to really congratulate you for that,’ Dr Ngome-Abiaga stated.
The UNESCO Country Rep sought further partnership with Abia State Government in three areas, including health, education, and giving more visibility in other areas that are in the mandate of UNESCO, as well as the budget provision for health and education.
He declared that he came to support the programmes of the governor and offered to put the global organisation’s technical expertise at the Governor’s disposal in any area of need.
According to him, “In terms of UNESCO support, we have been working very hard together with your people, with your institutions. We have trained more than 1,000 teachers on health and education. We have engaged more than 700 community and religious leaders in our health, education, and HIV education.
“We have engaged more than 300 schools. And all these started when you launched the Abia First Education Initiative. So, we would like to thank you for that, and we would like to continue to support you in that very important agenda.”
Responding, Governor Alex Otti assured that their request for partnership, support to reduce the number of out-of-school children, and more budgetary allocation to health and education would be considered as issues germane to multi-sectoral development of the State.
“Those are good, and they are imperative for a government that is serious. And we can only say thank you and welcome.
While highlighting achievements in education, particularly in the free and compulsory education, renovation of schools, recruitment of 5,394 teachers, training of teachers and providing special discriminatory remuneration of the teachers among others, the Governor announced that the Computer Based Test (CBT) would be conducted for the second batch of teachers’ recruitment exercise next week, for about 24,000 successful applicants who have been selected for the exams.
The State Chief Executive said that in the last three years government has devoted 20 per cent of the budget to the education sector and 15 per cent to health.
“We’ll go back and look at how we can further partner with you; how we can use you, like you have asked, for the good of our people, because you are the United Nations, you are not a profit-making organisation,” Otti stated.
Also speaking, the Chief Executive Officer of Sterling One Foundation and a strategic partner to the United Nations, Mrs Olapeju Ibekwe, invited the governor to the Africa Social Impact Summit conference in July as a guest of honour.
She explained that, “It is a platform for us to accelerate the SDGs and it seeks to reduce silo execution and catalyse multi-level, multi-sectoral partnerships across the public sector, private sector and the third sector.
“So, this platform was born just after COVID-19 in 2022, and since then, it’s been able to unlock over $100 million because the platform has three main goals, and the goals are partnerships, impact investment and policy advocacy.”
