The Chairman of the Osun State chapter of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, Mr. Amudah Wakeel, has said that granting autonomy to local government councils will cripple primary education in the country. He said this in an interview with our correspondent, on the sidelines of a protest staged by teachers at the State House of Assembly complex in Osogbo, the state capital.
Wakeel warned that teachers’ salaries would begin to suffer as soon as local government councils became autonomous because the councils lacked the financial capacity to fund primary education. Giving the assurance that the NUT was not opposed to autonomy for the third tier of government, he said its only concern was the problem which might arise as a result of the councils’ inability to pay the salaries of primary school teachers as at when due.
The NUT chairman also proposed that budgetary allocations to states from the federation account should be reviewed upward in favour of the states in order to guarantee uninterrupted primary education in the country. In the alternative, he said, the salaries of primary school teachers should be paid through the Universal Basic Education Commission from the first line charge from the Federation Account.
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