Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, while accepting the 2024 Vanguard Group award, highlighted the significant challenges faced by Edo State youth attempting to migrate to Europe through the desert. He attributed this trend to the breakdown of the state’s education system.
Obaseki emphasized that the dire situation led his administration to initiate the Edo Basic Education Sector Transformation program, aimed at revolutionizing basic education in the state. Initially designed for primary schools, the program has now been extended to Junior Secondary Schools, covering the nine years of basic education.
He stated, “When we came in about seven years ago, we were worried about the future of our children. EdoBEST is not just a political program, as some people think. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) informed us that there were 30,000 Edo boys and girls waiting in Libya to cross to Europe. If 30,000 of our youths were waiting to cross, can you imagine how many may have died on their way? If that was not frightening enough, then what other thing will.”
The Governor explained how his administration collaborated with relevant agencies to repatriate and rehabilitate these youths, and through data collection, they discovered that the broken educational system was a significant factor driving youth migration.
He continued, “So when we set up a task force, fought with the NAPTIP and we started collaborating with IOM to lift these children back and as they come, we welcome them, we rehabilitate them, reunite them with families, we were collecting data and we found out what the root cause was and we found out that it is because the educational system was broken…”
Obaseki stressed that the EdoBEST program focuses not only on getting children into school but also on ensuring they receive quality education.
The Editor of Vanguard Newspaper, Eze Ezeanaba, along with other members of the Vanguard team, commended Governor Obaseki for his reforms in the education sector, which have inspired other governors. He stated, “We are giving you this award because we looked at some of the things that have impacted and also inspired other states. We were with one of your colleague governors; he said we want to send people to Edo to study what they are doing in the education sector. This is the reason for this award.”
Ezeanaba highlighted the importance of education in securing the future of Nigeria’s children, emphasizing that Obaseki’s EdoBEST program is a significant step in the right direction. He concluded, “The biggest problem of Nigeria today is the threat to our future, children are not going to school, cultism is on the increase but with what you are doing with EdoBEST, to the extent that your colleague wants to copy it, you deserve to be commended and awarded.”