The Universal Basic Education Programme is aimed at ensuring free education for Children at the primary school level and three years of Junior Secondary school. The program was launched in September 1999 while the law establishing UBEC was signed in 2004.
Part of the provisions of the programme is provision of funds to assist states in implementing ideals of the programme. For UBEC, 2% of the Cumulative Statutory releases of the country’s consolidated revenue fund is set aside to fund the programmes and projects.
A Dataphyte review of the UBEC portal shows that between 2005 and 2021, thirty two (32) states did not access over N48 billion in UBEC funds available for improving basic education across all states
The reason for the failure to access funds that are crucial to the educational outcomes of the states is likely because of the way the UBEC funds are structured. To access allocated UBEC funds, states must match the grant amount available up to at least 50%.
Section 11, subsection 2 of the law states that “For any State to qualify for the Federal government block grant pursuant to sub-section 1(l) of this section,such State shall contribute not less than 50% of the total cost of projects as its commitment in the execution of the project”.
What this means for instance is that, Ogun state has the highest amount of unaccessed funds up to N3.672 billion in the 16 years under review. In 2021 Ogun State could have accessed N946 million in UBEC funds, but to receive the “windfall”, it must match the amount of the grant offered up to 50%. This means Ogun State must provide the sum of N946 million and these funds must be for basic education and within the project areas that the fund covers. This means Ogun State must provide at least N473 million to access the available grant.
This stipulation is likely why, despite clear educational needs across most states in Nigeria, many states are failing to provide the matching grants needed to access the UBEC finance.
The budget allocation to the education sector in most states is deficient and not enough to match the UBEC grants available.
Beyond funds, UBEC provision also requires states to set-up a State Universal Basic Education Board, draw up state UBE action plans, open a dedicated account for the grant with the CBN, publish quarterly progress as well as quarterly financial reports in order to access the matching grants. While most states have set up the State Universal Basic Education Board, the rest of the conditions have been harder to live up to. For action plans, only Lagos, Enugu and Zamfara action plans or materials explaining the action plans can be easily found online. If states have these action plans it is not public and even though there is a section on the UBEC portal that should have state action plans, the section does not have these action plans. The quarterly progress reports as well as quarterly financial reports would also be problematic for states who already struggle with annual audit and financial reports.
Below are some of the reasons why the UBEC funds are important and why states should strive to access the funds:
Provision of Schools/Classrooms
The ratio of students to available schools for children accessing basic education in Nigeria remains high, a dilemma that accessing the fund could help to ameliorate.
If all of the primary school age children in any of the states above were to decide to attend the public primary schools, the number of students will overwhelm existing facilities.
Teachers’ Advancement
The fund also targets teachers’ professional development and could help advance teachers’ delivery of service to students, especially given the ratio of students to teachers.
Hope for Out of School Children
The funds could also be pivotal to creating infrastructures that could begin to address the number of out of school children across different states in the country.
States may be able to access the advantages of the UBEC grant if they block or re-prioritise their spendings and make provisions for the needed matching grants.
For instance, a Dataphyte report showed how the Osun state governor’s office budgeted N995 million for purchase of vehicles in 2022. The state’s Road maintenance agency also awarded another sum of N2.955 billion for supply of vehicles in the same year. The state did not access matching grants of up to N1.661 billion between 2005 and 2021. In Ondo state Dataphyte reported lack of equipment like chairs to sit on in some public primary schools.
Other reports have urged that states should repurpose their spendings, redirecting expenditure to matters of more importance.
UBEC on their part have lamented the amount of funds states are not accessing from the basic education funds.
Many states make commitments to education, but actions like the failure to provide matching grants that could assist in the delivery of these promises, cast doubts on the veracity of their commitments.