The National Association of Nigerian Students in Abuja on Sunday canvassed the introduction of subsidy in education sector to check insurgency and rising crime in the country.
NANS also advised President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently seek ways of establishing special courts on anti-corruption matters, saying the delay in prosecution of individuals involved in corruption cases was inimical to the ongoing anti-corruption war.
The President of NANS, Chinonso Obasi, stated these during a thanksgiving service held at the Faith Miracle International Church, to conclude the three-day prayer on the quick recovery and safe return of Buhari from medical trip overseas.
According to him, the introduction of subsidy in education would afford every Nigerian child the opportunity of being adequately educated, Obasi appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari to consider such as step as one of his legacies.
Obasi said, “We, the Nigerian students are the most marginalised people in this country and so, President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration has not shown any love to the Nigerian students.
“We are appealing to him to subsidise education. When you train a Nigerian child, you have trained a nation. He should not leave the responsibility of education the Nigerian child to the parents because if you don’t train us, in time to come, we will be more hazardous than Boko Haram terrorists, and more dangerous than the militants.
“Let’s save the future by educating every Nigerian child. Government should subsidise education, they should have some percentage of what they pay to also help the Nigerian child to go to school.
“If people are not educated, they will act under ignorance. It is at this platform of ignorance that you may not even hold them liable because they had the opportunity of directing them on the right thing to do earlier.
“The right thing is educating a child so that he could know the difference between right and wrong, legal and illegal. Nobody wants war in his country but there will be war if people are not educated, people can be lobbied to do things just to survive.
“A lot of them who have found themselves in a lot of atrocities and even dealings today are doing them not really because they were born to do that. It is because they must have been diverted by people of bad minds or people who don’t mean well.
“Therefore, for the country or the Federal government to safeguard the future of the country, they must redirect their funding to education, with a view to educating every Nigerian child.
“If a child does not have what it takes to go to school, if parents don’t have what it takes to go to school, the government must come in, to help the Nigerian child to go to school.”
Obasi, who hailed the successes recorded by the president administration in its war against corruption so far, appealed to the president to think of establishing special courts on corruption issues, saying the delay being witnessed in the prosecution of individuals linked with corruption, was affecting the corruption crusade.
The NANS President said, “The urgent appeal I’m making to Mr President and which was one of the reasons we were praying for him to come back is simply because of the anti-corruption war he’s fighting. I will also appeal to Mr President that the Federal Government should also establish a special anti-corruption court.
“We are canvassing for this special anti-corruption court because of the delay in prosecuting corruption cases in conventional courts. Again, sometimes, even when there’s glaring evidence, someone who would have been convicted will say he’s going on appeal. We cannot continue to go that way, the Federal Government should establish special courts that will look into cases of corrupt individuals and the time for that is now.”
He also challenged Buhari to direct the anti-corruption agencies to beam their searchlights on tertiary institutions, saying there were cases of monumental corruption going on in the nation’s ivory towers.
Obasi said, “The president should urgently order the anti-corruption agencies to beam their searchlight on our tertiary institutions. On our part, we have done a lot of things at his back and any time early this week, I would be submitting some reports directly to him on the anti-corruption war we have been fighting at his back. We believe so much that he’s going to swing into action.”