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Thursday, January 31, 2013
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
French Troops Control Key Airport in North Mali
(SEGOU, Mali) ? French forces have taken control of the airport in Kidal, seizing a key position in one of three provincial capitals the Islamist militants took over last year, officials said Wednesday. One Malian official said French troops even moved into the city, which was the last remaining urban stronghold of the Islamists in Mali.
French and Malian troops have recaptured two of the other provincial capitals, Timbuktu and Gao, in recent days, and been welcomed by overjoyed crowds. However, already concerns are emerging about whether the Islamists will try to return once France hands over the military operation to Mali and soldiers from neighboring countries.
Haminy Maiga, the interim president of the Kidal regional assembly, said French forces met no resistance when they arrived late Tuesday.
?The French arrived at 9:30 p.m. aboard four planes, which landed one after another. Afterwards they took the airport and then entered the town, and there was no combat,? said Maiga, who had been in touch with people in the town by satellite phone as all the normal phone networks were down.
?The French are patrolling the town and two helicopters are patrolling overhead,? he added.
In Paris, French army Col. Thierry Burkhard confirmed that the airport was taken overnight and described the operation in Kidal itself as ?ongoing.?
On Tuesday, a secular Tuareg rebel group had asserted that they were in control of Kidal and other small towns in northern Mali. Maiga said those fighters had left Kidal and were at the entry posts on the roads from Gao and Tessalit.
France, the former colonial ruler, began sending in troops, helicopters and warplanes on Jan. 11 to turn the tide after the armed Islamists began encroaching on the south, toward the capital. French and Malian troops seized Gao during the weekend, welcomed by joyous crowds. They took Timbuktu on Monday. The Islamists gave up both cities and retreated into the surrounding desert.
To help battle the Islamists in their desert hideouts, a U.S. military official says the Pentagon is considering setting up a drone base in northwest Africa to increase intelligence collection.
While most crowds in the freed cities have been joyous, months of resentment toward the Islamists already has erupted into violence in Gao.
Video footage filmed by an amateur cameraman and obtained by The Associated Press shows a mob attacking the symbol of the oppressive regime, the Islamic police headquarters.
Some celebrate cheering ?I am Malian,? while others armed with sticks and machetes attack suspected members of the Islamist regime. The graphic images show the mob as they mutilate the corpses of two young suspected jihadists lying dead in the street.
France?s president said his country?s forces would stay in Mali as long as necessary, but the French also have said they expect troops from African nations to take the lead as soon as they are able. There are now some 2,900 African soldiers in Mali, including 1,400 from Chad who are used to fighting in harsh, desert terrain like northern Mali.
Mali?s military was severely affected by last year?s coup and has a reputation for disorganization and bad discipline. Already Malian soldiers have been accused of fatally shooting civilians suspected of links to the Islamists. The military has promised to investigate the allegations.
___
Ahmed reported from Segou, Mali. Associated Press writer Lori Hinnant in Paris and Andrew Drake in Gao, Mali contributed to this report.
MORE:?Mali?s War: After Surging Into the Islamist-Held North, Will France Retreat?
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/timeblogs/middle_east/~3/JWxPhtaaCc4/
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Daredevil crosses the road ... 200 feet above it
SARASOTA, Fla. (AP) ? Famed daredevil Nik Wallenda glided 500 feet across a wire suspended 200 feet above the ground on Tuesday, wowing several thousand people below in his hometown of Sarasota.
Without a tether or safety net, Wallenda was the lone figure against a blue sky, aided only by a balancing pole. He made the death-defying stunt look easy, but the performance was anything but simple: it took dozens of circus workers to pull and release the thick black cables that controlled Wallenda's wire as he walked. The morning was windier than expected, and at one point near the end, Wallenda dipped down to one knee on the wire, which led to loud gasps among the crowd.
"I have to get into a zone where I kind of forget about everything else and just focus on what I'm doing," he said shortly before he stepped on the wire. "Fear is a choice but danger is real, and that's very, very true for my line of work."
When Wallenda went to one knee, the drama reached a fever pitch.
"Scary," said Neil Montford, a vacationer from the United Kingdom, while wiping sweat from his brow and looking skyward.
Wallenda, 34, wore a gold cross around his neck and prayed with his wife, children and parents prior to the walk.
"It's my job, it's my career, it's my passion, it's what I love to do," he said.
The Sarasota City Commission allowed the stunt without a tether. Wallenda wore a tether for the first time last summer when he walked across Niagara Falls because the television network that was paying for the performance insisted on it.
Wallenda is a seventh-generation high-wire artist and is part of the famous "Flying Wallendas" circus family. His great-grandfather, Karl Wallenda, fell during a performance in Puerto Rico and died.
But Wallenda wasn't focused on the possibility of tragedy. In the hours before the stunt, Wallenda walked underneath the wire, which was suspended between a crane and a condo in downtown Sarasota. He spoke of his city, of the nearby sparkling bay and how he loved to hear the cheers of the crowd while hundreds of feet up in the air.
___
Follow Tamara Lush on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tamaralush
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/wallenda-crosses-fla-tightrope-200-feet-over-road-164138847.html
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Number of jobs in social drops as cloud-based roles skyrocket | SMI
Home ? News, Social Business, social media advertising, Social Media News
According to the company?s Freelancer Fast 50 report for Q4 2012, social media jobs are down 5.1%, with Facebook and Twitter also feeling the pinch, with jobs dropping 8.4% and 6.4% respectively. This, the report says, is because ?negative reports have left advertisers confused whether using social networks as an advertising platform will pay off in the end?.
As such, email marketing jobs have shot up by 186%.
Meanwhile, web hosting jobs have skyrocketed by more than 3300%, unsurprising given the number of businesses moving into the cloud.
The top 10 performers
1: Web hosting +3340%
2: Software testing +2554%
3: Website testing +2055%
4: Website management +639%
5: Engineering +507%
6: Amazon web services +466%
7: Powerpoint +309%
8: Windows Desktop +305%
9: Word +211%
10: Email marketing: +186%
The bottom 10 performers
40: Internet marketing -1.4%
41: eCommerce -1.8%
42: Link building -3.1%
43: SEO -3.3%
44: Shopping carts -3.8%
45 iPhone -3.8%
46: Social networking -5.1%
47: Twitter -6.4%
48: Facebook -8.4%
49: iPad -14%
50: BPO -34%
?
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Suicide bomber kills 2 near Somali presidential palace
MOGADISHU (Reuters) - A suicide bomber blew himself up near the Somali presidential palace on Tuesday, killing at least two soldiers in a strike apparently aimed at the country's leaders, a palace guard at the scene said.
Officials working in the palace and guards said Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud was abroad at the time of the blast and Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon Saaid, whose house was near the site of the explosion, was safe.
The blast was the first this year in Mogadishu, where security has improved greatly since Al Shabaab - Islamist rebels allied to al Qaeda - were driven from the capital by African peacekeepers in late 2011.
The group - which wants to impose its strict version of Sharia or Islamic law - is fighting to topple Mohamud, whose election last year was the first such vote since warlords ousted military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.
"The man blew up himself near a wall between the Ethiopian embassy and the Somali PM's residence," Ahmed Ali, a Somali soldier at the presidential palace told Reuters.
The two buildings are inside a sprawling compound that also houses the presidential palace.
"One guard died there and then. Another died of his wounds. They were all the guards of the PM," said Ali. "The man was an al Shabaab defector. He had a gate pass, an identity card of the national security."
Guards at the palace who declined to be named said the blast partially damaged a small room made of iron sheets where the prime minister's guards are stationed, but little else was damaged. Buildings and cars within the compound were untouched.
OUSTED FROM URBAN CENTRES
The guards said the bomber was known to them, and frequently visited the palace. When he came by on Tuesday morning, the guards took the suicide bomber through a routine inspection and found he was clad in an explosive jacket.
The guards tried to prevent him from detonating his device, but it went off - killing one instantly and wounding two others.
Al Shabaab was not immediately available for comment on the attack.
The group fled to southern Somalia after quitting Mogadishu but in late September Kenyan troops forced it to withdraw from the port of Kismayu, its last major urban stronghold in the Horn of Africa nation.
That appears to have ended it as a quasi-conventional military force, though Al Shabaab remains a threat and has vowed to step up suicide bombings and hit-and-run attacks.
On January 17 the group said it had executed a captive French agent after a French commando mission to rescue him failed.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/suicide-bomber-strikes-near-somali-presidential-palace-guard-073336804.html
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Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Chris Brown investigated for possible assault
FILE - Singer Chris Brown appears at a news conference to announce his partnership with Ford's Sync, a voice activated hands free in car communication and entertainment system, in this Nov. 2, 2007 file photo taken in New York. Authorities are investigating allegations that Grammy-winning singer Chris Brown assaulted a man in a West Hollywood parking lot Sunday Jan. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/Peter Kramer, File)
FILE - Singer Chris Brown appears at a news conference to announce his partnership with Ford's Sync, a voice activated hands free in car communication and entertainment system, in this Nov. 2, 2007 file photo taken in New York. Authorities are investigating allegations that Grammy-winning singer Chris Brown assaulted a man in a West Hollywood parking lot Sunday Jan. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/Peter Kramer, File)
WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (AP) ? Grammy-winning singer Chris Brown is under investigation for an alleged assault in a West Hollywood parking lot, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said early Monday.
Deputies responding to a report of six men fighting Sunday night found the scene clear, but were told by witnesses that there had been a brief fight over a parking space.
"The altercation allegedly led to Chris Brown punching the victim," the department said in a statement released early Monday morning.
The "victim" wasn't identified but the celebrity website TMZ ? which first reported the fight outside the Westlake Recording Studio ? said it also involved Frank Ocean, one of the top nominees at Grammy Awards next month.
In a Twitter posting later, Ocean said he "got jumped by (Brown) and a couple guys" and suffered a finger cut.
It wasn't Brown's first problem in the run-up to the Grammys. His attack on singer Rihanna on the eve of the 2009 awards event overshadowed the show.
Last June, he was injured in a brawl with members of hip-hop star Drake's entourage at a New York nightclub.
No arrests were made. Brown was gone by the time deputies arrived but the department said the investigation is ongoing and Brown would be contacted later.
Email messages to Ocean's publicist and Brown's lawyer were not immediately returned. A man answering the phone at the recording studio declined to comment.
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Internet Tips - A Beginners Guide to Filtering Spam - Computer How ...
New Internet users who open email accounts can find that their joy at discovering online networking is impinged by spam. Spam, otherwise known as unsolicited electronic junk mail, is sent, often by advertising companies, to mass recipients at once. Sometimes receivers respond favorably to spam, which makes the whole process valuable to senders. Receivers who don?t want junk via electronic post however, can find spam annoying.
Spam can quickly fill your inbox and take time to wade through. In addition, if you are a conscientious Internet user you may be wary of accidentally opening spam that might contain a computer virus. Catching a Trojan or other computer virus via junk mail can add insult to injury.
Image credit: Renato Avanzini, Flickr
Spam filters
The first step to avoiding spam can be to employ an anti-spam filter tool. You can download anti-spam tools from the Internet; however, you will probably find that you already have a method of dealing with spam supplied by your email program. Windows Mail for example, provides junk email options for customers. Under the heading ?Tools? you could click on ?Junk-Email Options? and then choose how you would like to deal with potential spam via a list of choices.
[Read also: Why Gmail is The Best at Keeping Your Inbox Organized]
No automatic filtering
The first, but least safe option is to employ no automatic filtering. This would mean that you received all mail routinely whether it was junk or not. However, you could still block known spammers and other senders from whom you didn?t want to receive mail.
Low filtering
The second option is low filtering. This involves moving obvious spam to a junk folder. Low filtering can be useful if you don?t want to miss emails you want to receive that could otherwise be presumed to be junk if a higher filtering capacity was employed.
High filtering
High filtering is a great way to catch almost all forms of junk email, but it can sometimes result in messages you would have liked to receive being lost as well.
Safe list filtering should be used if you only want to receive mail from people you know and have placed on a safe list. Any other mail is automatically filtered.
[Recommended read: How to Avoid Falling for A Phishing Scam]
Permanent removal
The final option Windows offers is to opt for permanent removal of unsolicited mail. Such mail doesn?t go into a junk folder for you to check. Instead, all unsolicited messages and spam are permanently deleted before you get to see them.
Like Windows Mail, most email programs allow people to select filtering options of their choice to suit their needs. Not choosing to use a filtering system at all can be a mistake, as viruses and annoying mail are generally posted electronically to email users en masse in this fashion.
Deciding which filtering option is best for you and employing it straight away when you open an email account can be wise. By perusing the selection of choices offered by your email program regarding junk mail, you can effectively avoid most spam and safeguard your time, energy and safety as an email receiver.
About the Author: Sam Jones, the author, thinks that broadband is wonderful but that it still has some regulatory problems.
Source: http://www.computerhowtoguide.com/2013/01/guide-to-filtering-spam.html
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Should You Purchase Travel Insurance? | travelling with vision ...
Not Sure If You Want To Buy Travel Insurance?
?
We understand that next to your home and car, travel is one of the largest expenses in your life. ?Unfortunately there are situations that arise from time to time that make it impossible to travel or require you to return home in the middle of your trip.
We are often asked what travel insurance covers and how travel insurance differs from credit card coverage. ?As far as credit cards go, they all have different coverage, some of it extensive and some of it very limited. ?This is something you need to investigate to get the specific details.
We?ve outlined 9 different scenarios to consider when assessing your travel insurance coverage. ?Our partner, Manulife Insurance, covers you in all these situations depending on what insurance package you purchase.
?
?
-
Illness or Injury
If you have or your travelling companion or a family member not travelling with you has an unexpected illness or injury, can you cancel your trip and receive a full refund?
-
Return Home
If you are at destination and a family member back home becomes unexpectedly ill or injured, will you be able to fly home and be reimbursed?
-
Extra Unexpected Costs
Can you afford the extra hotel, meal, phone and land transportation costs associated with a longer-than planned stay due to an unexpected illness?
-
Laid Off
Would you be able to cancel your trip and be reimbursed for your pre-paid non-refundable trip should you be laid off from work?
-
Canadian Travel Advisory Before You Leave
If the Government of Canada issues a new warning advising Canadians that they must not travel to the destination you?ve chosen, will you be able to cancel your trip and receive a full refund?
-
Canadian Travel Advisory After You Leave
If you are advised by the Government of Canada that you must leave your vacation destination, will you be able to purchase and claim for a new one-way flight home?
-
Sickness While on Your Trip
If you get sick while travelling, are you covered for medical expenses that you may incur?
-
Lost Luggage
Can you afford to purchase clothing and necessities should your luggage go astray or get delayed?
-
Snow Storm, Fog, Car Breakdown
If your trip is interrupted due to weather conditions or mechanical failure of your car or connecting common carrier, can you afford hotel and food expenses associated with this trip interruption? Can you afford the cost of another direct flight to catch up with your trip or to return home?
Vision 2000 can offer you an enhanced travel product at a very competitive rate!
Manulife Travel Insurance travels with you; our All-Inclusive plan covers you for all of the listed unexpected events and more.* We provide up to $5 million in emergency medical expenses and provide caring multilingual assistance and support 24 hours a day 365 days of the year, around the world.
Source: http://travelling.vision2000.ca/2013/01/28/should-you-purchase-travel-insurance/
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Exclusive 'This Is The End' Set Visit: Seth Rogen Welcomes The Apocalypse
Jonah Hill and friends hunker down at James Franco's pad during our 2013 preview.
By Kevin P. Sullivan, with reporting by Josh Horowitz
The cast of "This is the End"
Photo: Sony Pictures Entertainment
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Monday, January 28, 2013
Bugs in the atmosphere: Significant microorganism populations found in middle and upper troposphere
Jan. 28, 2013 ? In what is believed to be the first study of its kind, researchers used genomic techniques to document the presence of significant numbers of living microorganisms -- principally bacteria -- in the middle and upper troposphere, that section of the atmosphere approximately four to six miles above Earth's surface.
Whether the microorganisms routinely inhabit this portion of the atmosphere -- perhaps living on carbon compounds also found there -- or whether they were simply lofted there from Earth's surface isn't yet known. The finding is of interest to atmospheric scientists, because the microorganisms could play a role in forming ice that may impact weather and climate. Long-distance transport of the bacteria could also be of interest for disease transmission models.
The microorganisms were documented in air samples taken as part of NASA's Genesis and Rapid Intensification Processes (GRIP) program to study low- and high-altitude air masses associated with tropical storms. The sampling was done from a DC-8 aircraft over both land and ocean, including the Caribbean Sea and portions of the Atlantic Ocean. The sampling took place before, during and after two major tropical hurricanes -- Earl and Karl -- in 2010.
The research, which has been supported by NASA and the National Science Foundation, was scheduled to be published online January 28th by the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"We did not expect to find so many microorganisms in the troposphere, which is considered a difficult environment for life," said Kostas Konstantinidis, an assistant professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. "There seems to be quite a diversity of species, but not all bacteria make it into the upper troposphere."
Aboard the aircraft, a filter system designed by the research team collected particles -- including the microorganisms -- from outside air entering the aircraft's sampling probes. The filters were analyzed using genomic techniques including polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and gene sequencing, which allowed the researchers to detect the microorganisms and estimate their quantities without using conventional cell-culture techniques.
When the air masses studied originated over the ocean, the sampling found mostly marine bacteria. Air masses that originated over land had mostly terrestrial bacteria. The researchers also saw strong evidence that the hurricanes had a significant impact on the distribution and dynamics of microorganism populations.
The study showed that viable bacterial cells represented, on average, around 20 percent of the total particles detected in the size range of 0.25 to 1 microns in diameter. By at least one order of magnitude, bacteria outnumbered fungi in the samples, and the researchers detected 17 different bacteria taxa -- including some that are capable of metabolizing the carbon compounds that are ubiquitous in the atmosphere -- such as oxalic acid.
The microorganisms could have a previously-unidentified impact on cloud formation by supplementing (or replacing) the abiotic particles that normally serve as nuclei for forming ice crystals, said Athanasios Nenes, a professor in the Georgia Tech School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.
"In the absence of dust or other materials that could provide a good nucleus for ice formation, just having a small number of these microorganisms around could facilitate the formation of ice at these altitudes and attract surrounding moisture," Nenes said. "If they are the right size for forming ice, they could affect the clouds around them."
The microorganisms likely reach the troposphere through the same processes that launch dust and sea salt skyward. "When sea spray is generated, it can carry bacteria because there are a lot of bacteria and organic materials on the surface of the ocean," Nenes said.
The research brought together microbiologists, atmospheric modelers and environmental researchers using the latest technologies for studying DNA. For the future, the researchers would like to know if certain types of bacteria are more suited than others for surviving at these altitudes. The researchers also want to understand the role played by the microorganisms -- and determine whether or not they are carrying on metabolic functions in the troposphere.
"For these organisms, perhaps, the conditions may not be that harsh," said Konstantinidis. "I wouldn't be surprised if there is active life and growth in clouds, but this is something we cannot say for sure now."
Other researchers have gathered biological samples from atop mountains or from snow samples, but gathering biological material from a jet aircraft required a novel experimental setup. The researchers also had to optimize protocols for extracting DNA from levels of biomass far lower than what they typically study in soils or lakes.
"We have demonstrated that our technique works, and that we can get some interesting information," Nenes said. "A big fraction of the atmospheric particles that traditionally would have been expected to be dust or sea salt may actually be bacteria. At this point we are just seeing what's up there, so this is just the beginning of what we hope to do."
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Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Georgia Institute of Technology. The original article was written by John Toon.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
- Natasha DeLeon-Rodriguez et al. Microbiome of the upper troposphere: Species composition and prevalence, effects of tropical storms, and atmospheric implications. PNAS, 2013 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1212089110
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/cYVLxy1Cfts/130128151912.htm
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Video: Program offers cheap cooking tips
Police: Brazil nightclub fire kills at least 232
At least 232 people were killed after a band?s fireworks show sparked a rapidly moving fire in a packed nightclub in southern Brazil and fleeing patrons were unable to find their way out, local police said.
Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40153870/vp/50601555#50601555
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Sunday, January 27, 2013
lteydanie: Office Ergonomics | Learn the Secrets of Good Health ...
lteydanie: Office Ergonomics | Learn the Secrets of Good Health ?
Office Ergonomics | Learn the Secrets of Good Health & Fitness ?
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Source: http://binitasharma95.blogspot.com/2013/01/office-ergonomics-learn-secrets-of-good.html
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Get cirrus in the fight against climate change
FEATHERY cirrus clouds are beautiful, but when it comes to climate change, they are the enemy. Found at high-altitude and made of small ice crystals, they trap heat - so more cirrus means a warmer world. Now it seems that, by destroying cirrus, we could reverse all the warming Earth has experienced so far.
In 2009, David Mitchell of the Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nevada, proposed a radical way to stop climate change: get rid of some cirrus. Now Trude Storelvmo of Yale University and colleagues have used a climate model to test the idea.
Storelvmo added powdered bismuth triiodide into the model's troposphere, the layer of the atmosphere in which these clouds form. Ice crystals grew around these particles and expanded, eventually falling out of the sky, reducing cirrus coverage. Without the particles, the ice crystals remained small and stayed up high for longer.
The technique, done on a global scale, created a powerful cooling effect, enough to counteract the 0.8 ?C of warming caused by all the greenhouse gases released by humans (Geophysical Research Letters, DOI: 10.1002/grl.50122).
But too much bismuth triiodide made the ice crystals shrink, so cirrus clouds lasted longer. "If you get the concentrations wrong, you could get the opposite of what you want," says Storelvmo. And, like other schemes for geoengineering, side effects are likely - changes in the jet stream, say.
Different model assumptions give different "safe" amounts of bismuth triiodide, says Tim Lenton of the University of Exeter, UK. "Do we really know the system well enough to be confident of being in the safe zone?" he asks. "You wouldn't want to touch this until you knew."
Mitchell says seeding would take 140 tonnes of bismuth triiodide every year, which by itself would cost $19 million.
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Saturday, January 26, 2013
FDA head and company CEOs cheer bumper haul of new drugs
DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - Pharmaceutical industry productivity is improving as a more targeted approach to drug development yields dividends and regulators offer speedier decisions on medicines that make a real difference to patients.
That is the view of both the head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and drug company CEOs meeting in Davos this week at the World Economic Forum.
"The products that we have approved in the last two years do give us real cause for optimism," FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg told Reuters.
A total of 39 new drugs won approval last year - a record only beaten in 1996 - up from 30 in 2011, which itself was a marked improvement on the 21 cleared in 2010.
The industry badly needs a winning streak after delivering poor returns for several years due to a wave of patent expires on older products and a notable failure to bring enough new drugs to market to replace them.
The advance reflects progress in understanding the basic science of many diseases - notably some types of cancer - as well as smarter use of tests to target treatments to specific patient groups based on genetic profile.
"Not only have we been able to approve more new drugs that have real benefits for patients but also classes of drugs that signal where we are going in areas like personalized medicine, where we've been able to use diagnostics to target sub-populations of responders," Hamburg said.
The attitude of the FDA has also helped, according to Novartis CEO Joe Jimenez.
"The FDA has really shifted back to a very disciplined scientific approach to drug approvals, so we are starting to see more drug approvals come through," he said.
These days, however, winning approval for a new medicine is not the whole story. Drug manufacturers also have to fight hard to win a place for their usually pricey new products on lists of treatments covered by insurers or state health services.
The rigor of having to prove the value, as well as clinical effectiveness, of new medicines is helping to make companies more targeted in developing drugs that have a clear edge - even is this involves zeroing in on small, niche markets, said Sanofi Chris Viehbacher.
Discovering new medicines and progressing them through the three required stages of clinical development remains, however, a complex business with a fair dose of serendipity.
"It's not like engineering where the iPhone 5 follows on from the iPhone 4. Coming up with a new drug requires skill, insight and luck," said Merck & Co Ken Frazier.
"But we are on the verge, potentially, of a new wave of pharmaceutical innovation - and I think Merck stands to be at the forefront of that new wave."
(Reporting by Ben Hirschler; Editing by Peter Graff)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fda-head-company-ceos-cheer-bumper-haul-drugs-183313727--finance.html
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Education Sector in Crisis: Evidence, Causes and Possible ...
Being text of? the 2012/2013 Distinguished Lecture of Joseph Ayo Babalola University (JABU), Ikeji Arakeji, Osun State. Thursday, January 24th 2013.
?Trained talent is the yeast that transforms a society and makes it rise.?
? Lee Kuan Yew, former Prime Minister of Singapore in his ?From Third World to First: The Singapore Story, 1965-2000??
?
==========
PREAMBLE
I would like to thank the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sola Fajana, for inviting me to deliver the 2012/2013 Distinguished Lecture of Joseph Ayo Babalola University (JABU).? I understand that the Distinguished Lecture Series was introduced in the 2011/2012 academic session, JABU?s sixth year in existence.? I heartily congratulate JABU on the recent graduation of its fourth set of students.
While the topic of last year?s Lecture was broad-gauged ? ?Whither Nigeria? (delivered by versatile Professor Akin Oyebode) ? I?ve been requested to focus sharply on Nigeria?s Education sector. For almost four decades (1949-1988), I was continuously attached to one educational institution or another at primary, secondary and tertiary levels in succession. At the tertiary level, I studied and/or taught in several universities on the African continent, in Europe and in North America. I would add that I participated in academic conferences, seminars and workshops across all the continents from the early 1970s through the 1980s and 1990s to the early 2000s.? Consequently, some of the observations that I make in this Lecture draw on lessons learned from both good and bad practices across the continents.
PART ONE: INTRODUCTION
The title of this Lecture, ?Education sector in Crisis? in reference to any country must be considered a cause for serious concern because of the great value attached to education world-wide.? It is widely acknowledged that education has social, economic, political, and security benefits for an individual, for a society and for a country: ?Education is almost everywhere considered as the key to economic prosperity and a vital instrument for combating disease, tackling poverty, and supporting sustainable development. ?At the international level, ?Education for All? (EFA), an initiative of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) was launched in 1990.? Twenty-two years later, UNESCO?s parent organisation, the United Nations, launched ?Education First Initiative? that seeks to unite businesses, governments, nongovernmental organisations, teachers, parents and pupils in a 1,000-day campaign to get every child into quality education by the end of 2015. Former British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who is UN special envoy for global education, put the case for the new Initiative as follows:
Under current trends, 50 million children worldwide will be out of school in 2025, and in 50 years education for all will remain a hollow dream?the cause of educational opportunity [is] the civil rights issue of our generation (bold and italics added)?Extending educational opportunity is a moral, economic and security imperative?
In-between these two initiatives, there was the United Nations Millennium Declaration of 2000 that included education as one of Eight (8) Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).? Specifically, according to MDG 2 the Goal is to ?attain universal primary education in all countries by 2015? and the Target is to ?ensure children of both sexes everywhere will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling.? Nigeria joined 189 other countries world-wide to endorse the Declaration.
While there is broad agreement in the literature on education that it benefits both the individual and society, there is contestation on whether governments should pay more attention to primary education whose benefits to the society as a whole are very substantial than to tertiary education with huge benefits for the individual.? As will be demonstrated later in this Lecture, the argument over the relative benefits to individuals and to society is akin to the chicken and egg debate: without the quality products of tertiary education, quality primary education is unachievable and vice versa.
Strikingly, the success story of educational development in Western Nigeria in the 1950s and early 1960s was characterised by actions that respond to the issues raised in the preceding paragraphs.? A free universal primary education (UPE) programme was launched in January 1955 and politicians and civil servants collaborated to ensure its effective implementation. ?The public was mobilised in support of UPE: there was active involvement of communities, faith-based organisations, private entrepreneurs, and parents/adults through payment of taxes.? (Parents also provided uniforms and books for their children).
After a decade (that is, by 1965), primary education completion rate was between 80 and 100 per cent throughout Western Nigeria.? Furthermore, the launch of universal free primary education was accompanied by rapid expansion of post-primary education: 5-year Secondary/Grammar Schools and 3-Year Modern Schools. The latter were introduced to provide post-primary education for the hugely increased primary school leavers who could not gain admission to the Secondary/Grammar Schools. Simultaneously with the launch of UPE, teacher training was significantly scaled up through the expansion of colleges responsible for training teachers for primary and post-primary education.? Finally, in 1962, the Western Nigeria government established a university (University of Ife, later re-named Obafemi Awolowo University) and in 1963, Adeyemi College of Education was established. (For details on the Western Nigerian experience, see S. Gbadegesin, S.? and R. Sekoni, eds., 2010).
From the above summary it is obvious that the Western Nigeria experience has important lessons for all advocates of rapid educational development world-wide, with particular reference to universal primary education. Yes, UPE can be successfully implemented and yield huge dividends within a decade. The experience also demonstrates that successful implementation of UPE requires attention to secondary education, teacher training, and tertiary education.
After this Introduction, the Lecture is in three other parts.? In Part Two, I provide evidence of the crisis in Nigeria?s education sector that justifies the title, ?Education Sector in Crisis?.? Part Three highlights the major causes of the crisis.? In Part Four, I proffer some possible remedies that could help re-launch the country on the path to educational excellence.? In closing, I offer ?A Word for JABU: Challenge of Being Part of the Solution? and a ?Last Word?.
?
PART TWO: EVIDENCE OF CRISIS
The word ?evidence? is used here not in the legal sense but in the ordinary dictionary meaning such as what is provided in The New Oxford Dictionary of English: ?the available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid?
Since I returned to the country about eight years ago, I have read reports in the country?s newspapers that constitute strong evidence of a crisis in the education sector at all levels: from primary education through secondary to tertiary education. From time to time, politicians, academics and opinion leaders either called for the declaration of a ?state of emergency? in the education sector or lamented what they consider as decline and decay in the education sector: while some affirm that 70 per cent of university graduates are unemployable because of their poor quality, others focus on the country?s slow progress towards meeting the MDG goal on completion of primary education by all school-age children (female and male) by 2015. It is sad to note that a national dialogue on ?Nigeria and Education: the challenges ahead? held almost two decades ago concluded that ?The nation must now consider seriously the desirability of declaring a five-year emergency? for the rescue of our educational system? (Akinkugbe, 1994, p. 329).
At the personal level, I was reminded of the lost era of educational excellence when in late 2000s, a taxi driver, who drove me in Lagos and who only completed Modern School education in the ?old? Western Nigeria, was more articulate in spoken English than some current first degree holders!
I summarise below selected ?facts? and ?information? on the decline and decay in the country?s education sector.
A.??????? Basic education: Low enrolment and low quality teachers
- 10.5 million Nigerian children of school-going age are not attending school ? highest in the world. ?Source: Education For All (EFA) Global Monitoring Report 2012. (Introduction of EFA goal of one-year Early Childhood Care and Education ? three years in Sweden ? is unlikely to happen soon).
- According to the World Economic Forum?s Global Competitiveness Report Index, 2011-2012, Nigeria was ranked 140th out of 144 countries in primary education enrolment.
- ?National Planning Minister, Shamsuden Usman, said two years ago? that Northern Nigeria harboured the highest number of school-age children in the world that were out of school?. ?Source: Punch, October 16, 2012
- Enrolment of children into schools is as low as 12.0% in some states. Source: Leadership (Abuja), 11/09/2012
- 6 million of 36 million girls out of school world-wide are Nigerians.
- Nigeria is one of the few countries in the world that has had to launch a boy-child education campaign ? launched by the Federal government in the South-east in June 2012
- In 2008, Kwara State tested 19,125 teachers in Primary Four Mathematics? Only seven teachers attained the minimum benchmark for the test in Mathematics.? Only one of 2,628 teachers with degree passed the test; 10 graduates scored zero. The literacy assessment recorded only 1.2 per cent pass. Source: The Nation, August 30th 2012
B.???????? Secondary education: students? poor performance records
- The following are the percentages of students who obtained five credits, including English and Mathematics in the May/June WAEC over the last five years: 23% (2008), 26% (2009), 24% (2010), 31% in 2011 and 39% in 2012.
- Regarding NECO, failure rate was 98% in 2008, 88% in 2009, 89% in 2010, 92% in 2011, and 68% in 2012.
- Percentage of students who scored 200 and above (out of 400 total) in JAMB in the last four years ranged between 36% (2010) and 46% (2009) ? overall average of 42%. In 2012, only 3 of 1,503,93 candidates scored above 300 and only 5% scored 250 and above
- ?The single biggest problem [in Nigerian universities] is the abysmal quality of the intake; the vast majority of my students barely know their grammar, never mind the poor quality of their knowledge?. ?Source: Mohammed Haruna, in reference to his part-time teaching experience in a first-generation university (teaching Journalism), The Nation, November 28th 2012
- According to the World Economic Forum?s Global Competitiveness Report Index, 2011-2012, Nigeria was ranked 120th out of 144 in secondary education enrolment.
C.??????? Universities: some specifics on decline
- ????????? ?The most ridiculous indication of the rot in our universities was the recent reported dismissal of three graduates of the Enugu State University of Science and Technology from the National Youth Service Corps scheme for falling below the standard expected of graduates.?? (The university is reported to have declared ?an academic emergency?
Source: Punch, Editorial, December 14th 2012
- ??Nigeria?s university system is in crisis of manpower (italics and bold added). Instead of having no less than 80% of the academics with PhDs, only 43% are PhD holders while the remaining 57% are not.? And instead of 75% of the academics to be between Senior Lecturers and Professors, only about 44% are within the bracket while the remaining 56% are not.? The staff mix in some universities is alarming?Kano State University, Wudil [established in 2001] has only one professor and 25 PhDs?. Source: Committee on Needs Assessment of Nigerian Public Universities. Main Report (2012)
- Almost all the universities are over-staffed with non-teaching staff: in many universities, the number of non-teaching staff doubles, triples or quadruples that of teaching staff; and in some, the number of senior administrative staff alone is more than the total number of teaching staff. Source: ibid.
- ?There is an average of 4 abandoned projects per university in Nigeria? ? with negative consequences for classrooms, laboratories, students? hostels, and staff accommodation. Poor infrastructure adversely affects teaching, research, learning and students? health and safety. ?Source: ibid.
- Minister decries lack of Nigerian academic journals [that are cited] abroad. Source: The Nation, September 6th 2012
- There are 75,000 Nigerian students in Ghana who pay not less than N160 billion as tuition alone annually, compared with the annual budget of N121 billion for the entire federal universities in Nigeria. Source: The Sun, September 20th, 2012.
- In 2010, Nigerian students spend about N246 billion in tertiary institutions in UK, more than 60% of education sector budget in 2012. Source, Vanguard, June 7th 2012
- Universities do not have adequate supply of PhDs but PhD holders seek graduate-level positions and some compete to be truck drivers.
In addition to the above sector-specific illustrations, broad-gauged evidence of huge decline in?? all aspects of quality education measurement on an African comparative basis is provided in Table 1 below. ?It is based on the 2012 Mo Ibrahim Good Governance Index, Education Sub-Category of the Human Development Category. (The three other Categories of the Index are: Safety and Rule of Law; Participation and Human Rights; and Sustainable Economic Opportunity). The six indicators used to calculate the scores recorded in the Table are: education provision and quality, ratio of pupils to teachers in primary school, primary school completion, progression from primary to secondary education, tertiary education, and literacy. According to the evidence, education performance in Nigeria declined significantly between 2006 and 2011: score declined from 51% to 47.6% in and Nigeria?s rank declined from 21st to 30th.? It is striking that there was improvement across the continent: from an average of 49.4% score in 2006 to 53.8% in 2011, an increase of 4.4% contrasted with Nigeria?s decrease of 3.4%.
TABLE 1:
NIGERIA?S SCORE AND RANK IN EDUCATION SUB-CATEGORY,
MO IBRAHIM GOOD GOVERNANCE INDEX, 2006 ? 2011
| YEAR | NIGERIA?S SCORE (%) | AFRICA?S AVERAGE SCORE (%) | NIGERIA?s RANK |
| 2006 | 51.0 | 49.4 | 21st |
| 2007 | 48.8 | 50.9 | 24th |
| 2008 | 48.2 | 50.8 | 25th |
| 2009 | 48.4 | 51.8 | 25th |
| 2010 | 49.0 | 53.6 | 28th |
| 2011 | 47.6 | 53.8 | 30th |
| Change 2006 ? 2011 | -3.4 | + 4.4 | -9 |
NOTE
Nigeria?s poor performance in the Education sector is typical of the country?s performance in respect of all four Categories of the Mo Ibrahim Index in 2012: Nigeria dropped into the bottom 10 countries in the overall rankings for the first time: 14th out of the 16 countries in West Africa and 43rd out of the 52 countries in the Report ? Nigeria was 41st in 2011 and 37th in 2006.
PART THREE: CAUSES OF THE CRISIS
Three major causes of the crisis in the education sector are examined in this Lecture: (i) over-centralisation; (ii) implementation failure; and (iii) de-emphasis on the value of education and decline of the teaching profession. Some other causes of the crisis are linked in varying degrees to one or the other among the three main causes highlighted and they will also be mentioned, as appropriate.? The problem of corruption deserves special mention.? Although it is not highlighted as a major cause of the crisis, it will feature prominently as it is uniquely linked, in varying degrees, to both over-centralisation and implementation failure.
(i).??????? Over-centralisation ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
Over-centralisation is, without question, a major cause of the crisis in the education sector and its origin is unarguably the intervention of the military in the governance of the country.? The fact that military rule lasted for almost three decades (one of the longest in Sub-Saharan Africa) and was extended by a former military ruler and strong believer in centralisation who served as the first civilian president from 1999 to 2007, has resulted in the entrenchment of over-centralisation in a constitutional federal system.? The following are five key misbegotten legacies of military-imposed centralisation in the education sector:
(a)? At the primary education level, former president Obasanjo, the civilianised military who served between 1999 and 2007, invented a role for the federal government in primary education that was different from what the 1999 Constitution prescribes: Universal Basic Education (UBE) was designed as a federal government policy and programme in defiance of the provision in the 1999 Constitution that assigns responsibility for primary education to state and local governments.? The role of the federal government in primary education is limited to prescribing minimum standards as provided in the Constitution?s Second Schedule, Exclusive Legislative List, 60 (e).? ?Sadly, two civilian presidents have maintained this usurpation.? Former president Yar?Adua committed to abandoning this bad practice but he died within a year that he turned his attention to the subject.? (?I have also directed that all laws be examined that go against the federal system so that they will be amended to be in conformity with the federal system of government? (interview with London?s Financial Times reported in various national newspapers, May 20/08).? President Jonathan appears to be agnostic on the subject. In this area, it would be correct to assert that there has been leadership failure.
(b)? The military established unitary secondary schools, again contrary to the assignment of this function to sub-national level governments in the 1963 Constitution it suspended: only higher education was on the Concurrent Legislative List.? Now, Federal government involvement in post-primary education is currently provided for in the 1999 Constitution: ?the National Assembly to establish institutions for post-primary education? (Second Schedule, Part II, Concurrent Legislative List, (28).? But federal role in running secondary schools would qualify as a Nigerian military invention ? more on this later.
(c)? At the tertiary education level, military over-centralisation was extended to the regulatory agency for the universities, the National Universities Commission (NUC).? From its initial role as a buffer between the universities and governments, the NUC under military rule was transformed into an over-powerful and control-oriented government parastatal with very extensive powers that were more consistent with the centralism and uniformity of military culture than with the autonomous mind-set of academic culture.
(d)? The operation of centralised labour unions for teachers at all levels that made sense under centralised unitary military rule has been maintained under civilian rule when the hierarchical federal-state relationship no longer exists, at least, according to the 1999 Constitution.? Thus, both the Nigeria Union of Teachers and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) negotiate salaries and other conditions of service at the federal level and the agreements become binding on state governments that did not participate in the negotiations.? Persistent strikes that are linked to the challenge of implementing the agreements reached at such negotiations continue to undermine teaching and learning in educational institutions, especially the universities.
(e)? Perhaps the most extensively debated issue in military-inherited over-centralisation is the over-sized share of the federal government in the federation account, to the disadvantage of the sub-national governments.? This affects all sectors but it is particularly pertinent in the education sector because the hi-jacked primary education function (UBE) highlighted above was used as the rationalization for the maintenance of the federal government?s lion?s share of the Federation account under president Obasanjo.? Notwithstanding President Jonathan?s experience in sub-national governance, he appears to have adjusted nicely to the prevailing skewed revenue sharing arrangement. ?Well, he is the top dog now. Thus, he has ignored the persistent sensible call of Nigeria?s Governors? Forum for the modification of the existing unbalanced revenue allocation formula (52.68 to federal government, 26.72 to state governments, and 20.6 to local governments). ?And he is strangely comfortable with the failure of the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) and the National Assembly to act on the subject.
(ii)??????? Implementation Failure
Implementation failure can be due to either weak capacity to implement or the lack of political will to drive implementation. As pointed out in Part One, the UPE in Western Nigeria was successfully implemented because of the combination of a political leadership team with the will to drive its implementation and a competent civil service (also reputed as incorruptible) to execute the policy and deliver results on the ground in respect of both UPE and other aspects of educational development.
In contrast to the Western Nigerian experience, the UPE introduced at the national level in 1976 failed because there was no sustained political will to drive it.? Throughout the civilian interregnum of 1979-1983 and the return of the military for extended rule, the policy was abandoned. As already pointed out, the successor UBE that was launched in 2004 has achieved rather limited results. Muddled political responsibility for UBE has been a major constraint and centralised implementation (for example, contracts for purchase of textbooks for students in all 36 states are awarded in Abuja) has hindered federal-state collaboration that is essential for effective implementation. ?And there have been reports of corrupt practices associated with some UBE contracts.? ??Although there has been an emphasis on enhancing the professionalism of primary and secondary education teachers and improving their conditions of service to promote improved implementation capability, the political muddle combined with the inherent weakness of centralised implementation appear to have doomed a federal-driven UBE to failure.
A telling commentary on the weakness of the National Assembly (NASS), the apex watchdog institution charged with assuring effective implementation of government policies and programmes, is the poor education of its members: ?Some National Assembly members can barely write their names ? Ekweremadu? (Punch, October 16th 2012).? (Ekweremadu is the Deputy President of the Senate). To date, all the oversight missions of the National Assembly in respect of the different sectors, including education, are tales of corrupt practices without a single MDA being made to account for implementation failure: teams of senators and representatives strut the land and return to Abuja with additional millions to their obscene self-allocated salaries.? For example, NASS committees would rather descend on educational institutions for the usual extra earnings than organise a public hearing on how best to fix the 6-3-3-4 education system that is widely acknowledged as not being properly implemented.
(iii).????? De-emphasis on the value of education and decline of the teaching profession
It is incontrovertible that Nigerians across all the three/four regions valued education highly up to the emergence of military politicians whose culture and actions progressively resulted in a de-emphasis on the value of education.? It would not be unfair to assert that the politicians in khaki had limited understanding of educational excellence, notwithstanding the fact that a few of them decided to obtain university degrees, most often after retirement from service.? Because the military remained in power for so long (close to three decades), their anti-education orientation (or anti-intellectualism) had replaced the pre-military high value of education across the country.? Today, restoring high value for education in the Nigerian society has become a tough challenge.
My father travelled to Lagos during the First World War and encountered western education.? He returned to his community in Iju, Akure North to become a propagandist for education. Due to his example and inspiration, Iju had one of the highest concentrations of educated people (in proportion to total population) in the country at his death.? I am sure that similar stories abound of propagandists for education of my father?s generation in communities across the country.? It was on this fertile soil that Awolowo?s UPE seed was sown; and it flourished as already highlighted above.
Unfortunately, worship of money that accompanied the military?s anti-intellectualism appears to have replaced love for education.? Paradoxically, a former military ruler, Ibrahim Babangida, whose tenure was characterised by notable anti-intellectual measures, recently summed up the prevailing value (less) order as follows: ?Knowledge has no value while money and power has (sic) more value? (The Nation, November 25th 2012).? Even those who commit resources to education today appear to be spurred on by love of money, that is, the ever-increasing number of for-profit educational institutions from kindergarten, through primary to secondary and tertiary education.? The lack of distinction between for-profit and not-for-profit educational institutions in the country is almost certainly linked to the fact that office holders who ought to have championed making the distinction (including imposition of tax on the for-profit institutions) are guilty of benefitting from this cheating, another form of corruption.? It needs to be corrected without further delay.
It is important to stress the linkage of the de-emphasis on the value of education to the decline of the teaching profession.? In the 1950s and 1960s teachers at all levels were highly valued in the Nigerian society.? Primary and secondary school teachers were respected and trusted in communities across the country and teachers in tertiary institutions were acknowledged as a distinguished elite group.? That was also the era of educational excellence. Then, in 1973/74, military politicians and higher civil servants combined to rubbish the elite status of university teachers through the brash ?quit notice? from campus accommodation and the imposition of relative disadvantage in the context of a so-called post-Udoji re-alignment of salaries and wages in the public sector (Adamolekun and Gboyega, 1979).? Although ASUU has, through prolonged struggles, succeeded in achieving decent improvements in salary levels for universities, the rubbished elite status has persisted, sustained, in part, by the numerous strikes that have accompanied the Association?s struggles, and in part, by the dominance of money culture within the society.
The decline in public respect for, and trust in, primary and secondary education-level teachers started at about the same time as was the case for university teachers.? Beginning from the early 1980s, the decline was accentuated partly by wrong-headed policies that made teaching at these levels unattractive (mission and elite schools were taken over by governments and all were progressively reduced to mediocrity) and partly by neglect (low salaries, poor working environment and lack of incentives). The result was poor performing teachers and decline in standards.? Efforts aimed at restoring teacher professionalism that could, in turn, raise standards and enable teachers to regain public respect and trust have so far recorded limited success.? In some instances, the teachers and their Union are resisting reform, thereby perpetuating the prevailing decline.
PART FOUR: POSSIBLE REMEDIES OR PATH TO EDUCATIONAL EXCELLENCE
?In all, I propose five (5) possible remedies: (i) devolve educational development, (ii) increase funding for education, (iii) ensure reliability of education statistics, (iv) leapfrog use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in education; and (v) enhance university autonomy.
1. ??????? Devolve educational development
According to the Compulsory, Free, Universal Basic Education Act, 2004, ?the Federal government?s intervention under this Act shall only be an assistance to the States and Local Governments in Nigeria for the purpose of uniform and qualitative basic education throughout Nigeria?.? After eight years of implementation, enrolment in primary education falls far below MDG target and the ?assistance? of the federal government to Junior Secondary Schools that caused management nightmares for states has resulted in ?unified?, 6-year secondary schools in many states.? In these circumstances, I would recommend that the UBE Act should be repealed and the share of national revenues hi-jacked for the purpose by the Federal government should be shared among the states and local governments.
Full responsibility for achieving quality basic education (interpreted as 9 or 12 years, preferably the latter) belongs to these sub-national governments.? And it is only at these two levels that communities can be successfully mobilized for ownership of, and participation in, primary and secondary education ? as was the case in the ?old? Western Nigeria. ?Predictably, some states will perform better than others, reflecting differences in quality of leadership, political party orientation (there could be significant differences within the same party in different states), and level of administrative competence.? However, the resulting diversity would contribute more to reducing the number of school age children out of school than the poor performance recorded during the period of centralism and uniformity.
Furthermore, in the absence of empirical evidence to support the facile assertion regarding the usefulness of the so-called unity secondary schools (102+) for promoting national integration, the federal government should choose one of the following two options: either transfer the schools to state governments together with the annual budgetary allocation (pending the adoption of a new revenue allocation formula) or embrace the public private partnership for running the schools that was adopted during president Obasanjo?s final year but abruptly abandoned under president Yar?Adua.? It is worth adding that according to the Report of the Presidential Task Force on Education, the unity schools ?do not appear to be sources of excellence in secondary education and cannot be model for the States and other School Proprietors ? one of the reasons for establishing them in the first instance.?
2. ??????? Increase funding for education
Perhaps the first point to make is that Nigeria has sufficient financial resources for ensuring adequate financing of education at all levels.? According to newspaper reports in August 2012, the World Bank had estimated that about $400 billion oil money was stolen or mismanaged in the country between 1960 and mid-2012 of which over $250 billion between 1999 and mid-2012. According to another report, between 2006 and 2009, Federal government Ministries, Departments and Agencies (including law-enforcement units) failed to remit about N4 trillion to the Federation account. That translates to NI trillion per annum or 25% of the annual budget for those years. Furthermore, according to a Sunday Punch investigation (published on November 25th 2012), ?Over 5 trillion naira (about ($31billion) funds have been stolen through fraud, embezzlement and theft since President Jonathan assumed office in 2010?.
TABLE 2:
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT EDUCATION EXPENDITURE, 2009 ? 2013
?
| 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 |
| N224.7bn |
(10.6%)N271.2bn ? (6.4%)N306.3bn ? (6.2%)N400.2bn (8.4%)N426.5bn (8.7%)
In these circumstances, federal government?s education expenditure (actual for 2009-2011 and budgeted for 2012 and 2013) is grossly inadequate.??? This low level of funding needs to be significantly increased, beginning with the 2014 budget: a modest target would be 16 per cent, that is, double the average for 2009-2013, but still far below the desirable UNESCO?s recommended 26 per cent. ?According to the Report of the Committee on Needs Assessment of Nigerian Public Universities (2012), state governments also underfund education.? The situation in one state university was so pathetic that the Committee recommended ?Declaration of state of emergency in the university?.
Against this backdrop, it is important to mention the additional funds mobilised for the education sector through education taxes (introduced in 1993) and collected by the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS). (Total amount collected between 2008 and 2011 was about N400 billion).? Until 2011, all levels of education benefited from the fund, called Education Trust Fund.? By the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) Act 2011, proceeds of education taxes were to benefit only tertiary education institutions: universities, polytechnics and colleges of education.? Furthermore, NUC recently introduced the High Impact Intervention Fund for selected universities in geopolitical zones but its disbursement lacks predictability.
Notwithstanding these additional sources of funding, the financing gap in public universities remains huge. Today, there is strong support in the public universities for the introduction of fees.? This viewpoint has merit, taking into account developments in the university sector world-wide.? However, policy reform in this direction would need to be accompanied with an appropriate mix of scholarships, bursaries? and loans that would ensure that no Nigerian who is qualified for university education in a public institution is denied the opportunity because of his/her inability to pay prescribed fees.? An essential prior action to the introduction of tuition fees in public universities would be for the Federal Government to provide substantial capital fund for the take-off and effective functioning of the Nigerian Education Bank (EDUBANK Nigeria), established by law in 1994 as successor to the Students Loans Board that was repealed by the same law.
3. ??????? Ensure availability of reliable education statistics
An important dimension to the crisis in the education sector is the weakness of the statistical underpinnings of the national education system:? ?That data (both hard figures and soft explanations) are virtually non-existent and un-useable in the education system is an undisputed truism? (Report of the Presidential Task Team on Education, p. 17). Again, it is through a devolved approach that reliable education statistics can be produced and made available for the use of relevant stakeholders.? State governments need to provide appropriate incentives (a mix of sanctions and rewards) to local governments to ensure that they keep comprehensive data on childhood and primary education.? And state governments need to acknowledge and accept that they cannot achieve quality education without robust education statistics.? At the federal level, collaborative effort between the National Bureau of Statistics and the Federal Ministry of Education would be a sensible strategy for tackling this problem. The objective at both the federal and state levels should be, as recommended in the Report of the Presidential Task Team on Education, the establishment of ?functional educational management information systems (EMIS) that would facilitate evidence-based decision making in the sector.
4. ??????? Leapfrog use of ICT in education
Although ICT penetration is still low in the country, due partly to epileptic electricity supply and partly to broadband challenge, its role in helping to enhance teaching and learning has been embraced in several states. For example, a few states have provided laptops for students and teachers in secondary schools.? Ensuring regular electricity supply and scaling up broadband penetration from the current 6 per cent to the 20 per cent promised for 2017 are the conditions that would make leapfrogging use of ICT in education a reality across the country.? In the meantime, public and private secondary schools and universities that are able to successfully tackle both the electricity and broadband challenges can leapfrog to join other countries such as South Korea and USA in improving the quality of education through online/digital teaching and learning (see Box 1.)
?BOX 1:
PROGRESS TOWARDS DIGITAL EDUCATION IN SOUTH KOREA AND USA
?1. Around 30% of all college students are learning online ? up from less than 10% in 2002.
2. New online Western Governors University [founded in 1997 by 19 Governors]: Tuition costs less than $6,000 a year, compared to $54,000 at Harvard.? Students can study and take their exams when they want, not when the sabbaticals, holidays and scheduling of teaching staff allow. The average time to completion is just two-and-a-half years.
3. Massive open online courses (MOOCS) offer free college-level classes taught by renowned lecturers to all-comers? they are part of a trend towards the unbundling of higher education.
Source: ?Higher Education ? Not what it used to be? in Economist, December 1st 2012
?Over the next few years, textbooks should be obsolete?
? Arne Duncan, US Secretary for Education
?One of the most wired countries in the world, South Korea, has set a goal to go fully digital with its textbooks by 2015? Over the last two years, at least 22 states have taken major strides toward digital textbooks? In California, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a pair of bills in September aiming to make his state a national leader in electronic college textbooks.
Source: Washington Post (Washington, D.C.), October 2nd 2012
A California law that will become effective in 2013-2014 school year, allows college students to download up to 50 core textbooks for free in the form of e-books. The e-books are for classes at the University of California, California State University and California Community Colleges. The state has also established the California Open Education Resources Council for e-books.???? Source: Information accessed online on October 3rd 2012
5. ??????? Enhance university autonomy
The final possible remedy that I proffer is sharply focused on universities for two reasons.? First, I have been involved longer in this apex of the education sector than in the two other sub-sectors.? Second, I strongly believe that just as the fish gets rotten from the head, it would be correct to assert that the rot in the Nigerian education sector is most severe at the apex.? As soon as tangible improvements are recorded at that level, they are very likely to cascade down to polytechnics, secondary schools and primary schools.
(a)??? There is urgent need for a critical review of the functions of the NUC.? Currently, its functions include setting academic standards, inspecting and monitoring the standards and accrediting the universities. There is strong evidence that it?s centralized, domineering, and unified approach stifles experimentation and initiative at the level of individual universities (public and private). NUC appears unwilling to accept that uniformity and excellence are antithetical. The inability of universities to determine their curricula, subject to oversight through accreditation, derogates from university autonomy. ?I would also recommend that NUC?s accreditation function be hived off (together with staff and resources) and assigned to a separate independent statutory body that would not be tied to the apron strings of the Federal Ministry of Education and the Presidency.? This will be more consistent with a university education landscape where private universities constitute 40 per cent of the current 125 total (see Appendix 1). The Accreditation Board/Council will be exclusively concerned with accrediting public and private universities as is the case in Ghana, for example.
(b)?? There should be an immediate end to the operational subordination of universities to both the NUC and the Federal Ministry of Education that results in key officers of the institutions spending a significant proportion of time in Abuja instead of working on their campuses. According to Dr. Nasir Fagge, incumbent president of ASUU, ?You will find out that circulars are emanating in most cases from the National Universities Commission, interfering in the day-to-day running of the universities? (The Nation, Nov. 30th 2012). This bad practice undermines university autonomy.
(c)??? A critical aspect of university autonomy is the right to admit their students.? That right was taken away from Nigerian universities by the military that wrongly decided to centralise admission to all universities through the establishment of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) in 1977.? At the time, there were only twelve (12) universities, all owned by the federal government (four of them through what would qualify as forceful take over).? Although there has been more than tenfold increase in the number of universities (see Appendix 1) of which 40 per cent are privately-owned, the wrong-headed and disabling centralised admission policy is still in force.? Centralised admission should come to an end with the 2013/14 admission. This action will help to restore a crucial dimension of autonomy to Nigerian universities, both public and private.? The established basic university admission requirement will be maintained: a minimum of five (5) credits, including English and Mathematics, in WAEC or NECO.
A WORD FOR JABU: CHALLENGE OF BEING PART OF THE SOLUTION
The opening paragraph of the ?Brief on JABU? sheds light on the university?s focus on what has become accepted as a possible solution to the production of unemployed/unemployable graduates: ?Taking cognizance of the unacceptably high rate of unemployment of university graduates in the country, Joseph Ayo Babalola University intends to give all its graduates the capacity for self-employment, thereby making them self-reliant and self-sustaining, in addition to turning them into an effective army of human capital for the nation and vanguard in the war against societal ills?.? Indeed, JABU prides itself as ?The First Entrepreneurial University in Nigeria?.
However, there is a huge obstacle posed by the combination of epileptic electricity, poor transportation (roads and railways) and limited broadband penetration to both entrepreneurship development within the university and opportunities for self-employment after graduation.?? (The flight of medium and multinational manufacturing and industrial enterprises ? with the exception of oil and gas and telecom ? from our shores since the 2000s is testimony to this challenge ? only foreign retail shops are flocking into Nigeria). ?I expect that JABU, as a private university, is implementing coping mechanisms that would enable it fulfil its promise to students: ?No matter your area of study, we take you through entrepreneurial training to make you a potentially self-employed graduate and an employer of labour, without diminishing from the content and quality of your degree and ability to pursue postgraduate studies?.
The second area where JABU can make a difference would be through translating its commitment ?to seek and impart knowledge with high ethical standard? (bold added) to mean a campus culture that is underpinned by ethical values such as excellence, integrity, responsibility, and service.? And it is essential that the values are shared by all members of the community, especially the teachers.? Students that graduate with these values are likely to stand out in the society as diligent and incorruptible men and women in their places of work.? For JABU graduates to be recognised nation-wide as incorruptible would be an important contribution to the healing of a debilitating national disease.
Third and finally, for JABU to be in the vanguard of Nigerian universities that would be competitive both at the African and international levels, its leaders would need to seek to meet most of the following criteria that are used in recognising ?elite? universities world-wide within the shortest time possible.
- Favourable governance features that encourage strategic vision, innovation and flexibility to make decisions and manage resources without being encumbered by bureaucracy.
- A high concentration of talents ? Faculty (staff) and students
- Abundant resources to offer a rich learning environment and to conduct advance research
- Good liberal Arts education + high dose of Science and Technology
- Exposure to ICT
- Production of graduates who are in high demand
- Linkages with industry and investors
Source: Adegoke (2012). ?Adegoke adds that ?funding is key to development of world class status? and stresses the critical role of various types of endowments.
LAST WORD
My last word is the following: get education right, and you are on the path to prosperity and peace; get it wrong, and poverty and insecurity will deepen and persist.? For Nigeria to graduate from the miserable league of Middle-Income, Failed or Fragile States (MIFFS), (alias, ?poor little richer kids? ? Economist, July 23rd 2011), getting education right is the pre-eminent condition. I fully share the viewpoint of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore?s founding leader, that ?Trained talent is the yeast that transforms a society and makes it rise.? ?It is only through quality education that Nigeria can become a strong emerging economy within a decade or two: it holds the key to unlock progress in all spheres of development ? social, political, economic, and technological.
I thank you all for your attention
REFERENCES
Adamolekun, L. 2007. Challenges of university governance in Nigeria: reflections of an old fogey.? Convocation Lecture delivered at Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba, Ondo State.
Adamolekun, L. and A. Gboyega. 1979. (eds). Leading Issues in Nigerian Public Service, Ile-Ife, University of Ife Press.
Adegoke, O. 2012. ?What it takes to develop world class universities?, paper presented at 5th Forum of Laureates of the Nigerian National Order of Merit (NNOM), Abuja, December 4th 2012.
Akinkugbe, O.1994. Nigeria and education. The challenges ahead.? Proceedings and policy recommendations of the 2nd Obafemi Awolowo Foundation Dialogue. Ibadan: Spectrum Books
Brown, G. ?Education for all.? For disenchanted youth, salvation may lie in school?, The Washington Post, September 30th 2012
Effah, P. and A. Hofman (eds.). 2010. Regulating tertiary education. Ghanaian and international perspectives.? Accra: Ghana Universities Press.
Federal Republic of Nigeria. 2011. Report of the Presidential Task Team on Education. Main Report (Volume I)
__________. 2012. Committee on Needs Assessment of Nigerian Public Universities. Main Report.
Gbadegesin, S.? and R. Sekoni (eds.).? 2010. Legacy of Educational Excellence. Essays Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Universal Free Primary Education in Western Nigeria, 1955-2000. Mitcheville, MD, USA: Pinnacle Publications
Universal Basic Education Commission. 2005. The Compulsory, Free, Universal Basic Education Act, 2004 and Other Related Matters.
APPENDIX 1
DISTRIBUTION OF 125 NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES BY OWNERSHIP, DECEMBER 2012
?
| YEARS | FEDERAL | STATE | PRIVATE | REMARKS |
| 1948 -1969 | 5 | - | - | |
| 1970 -1979 | 8 | 1 | - | Only 12 federal universities had been established by 1977. |
| 1980 -1989 | 9 | 6 | - | |
| 1990 ? 1999 | 3 | 6 | 3 | All 3 private universities were established in 1999 |
| 2000 ? 2009 | 2 | 20 | 38 | Decade of huge expansion: 60 new universities |
| 2010 ? 2012 | 10 | 5 | 9 | 50 private universities were established within 13 years, 1999-2012. |
| TOTAL | 37 | 38 | 50 | Private universities constitute 40% of Total. |
Source: National Universities Commission Website ? accessed on December 17th 2012.
Note: 53 ?Illegal Degree Awarding Institutions (Degree Mills)? were also listed on the website with the following comment: ?This list of illegal institutions is not exhaustive?.
[Ladipo Adamolekun, an Oxford University D. Phil., is? one of Ondo State's Nine (9) of Nigeria's Sixty-Seven (67)? National Merit Awardees.? A former Dean of the Faculty of Administration at Ife and a former Lead Public Sector Management Specialist at The World Bank, Adamolekun is now an Independent Scholar.]
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