(National Planning Commission Report) – The Supervising Minister of the National Planning Commission, Bashir Yuguda has assured Nigerians that the Federal Government will not dump the recommendations that were put forward by participants at the 20th NESG held in Abuja, rather would look at
and adopt some of them.
Bashir Yuguda gave this assurance recently during the closing ceremony of the 20th Edition of the National Economic Summit held at the Transcorp Hilton, Abuja.
Yuguda revealed that the fallout of the 19th NESG which was centred on advancing the agricultural sector led to the initiation of government programmes for young farmers such as ‘Nagropreneurs’, the e-wallet system, creation of special facilities for increased funding for agriculture and considerations for commodities exchange as well as export processing zones.
The Minister stressed that the Government is committed to implementing the recommendations of the NESG, saying this year’s own will not be an exception. He promised to be consistent with the assertion earlier made by the Vice President, Namadi Sambo during the summit summary presentation to the Government, where he urged stakeholders to partner with Government in addressing the deficiencies in Nigeria’s
education sector.
He recalled the Vice President’s intention to develop a skilled workforce which will be able to drive the development of the Nigerian economy, drive change and innovation and ensure that Nigeria attains her rightful place in the commity of nations and added that this will be consistent with Government’s aspiration for the country to become one of the twenty largest economies in the world by year 2020.
He also commended the organisers and participants for extensively deliberating on issues that would re-position the education sector; stating that it is a known fact that the foundation of all successful modern nation-states is a well-articulated educational
system which engenders in society a modern mindset and a culture of learning capable of producing the right sets of functional skills and values to propel people towards achieving their highest potentials.
Also speaking, the Chairman of NESG, Folusho Philips expressed confidence over the implementation of the recommendations, noting that Vice President Namadi Sambo is already asking for the document.
The Director-General of NESG, Frank Nweke jnr. also indicated that President Good luck Jonathan has exercised more commitment to the NESG than
other Nigerian Presidents. He averred that the President is the initiator of the Presidential Policy Dialogue and has devoted maximum time to it.
In an earlier plenary session established on “Leadership and Ownership in Nigerian Education,” the Minister called for inclusive participation in moving the education sector forward, arguing that the business for moving the sector forward should not be that of Government alone.
He inferred that the present administration under the leadership of President Goodluck Jonathan has done well in uplifting education in Nigeria through the creation of access to funding, quality education and
collaboration with private and public partnerships.
Speaking on the envelope budget system, he noted that though Uche Chukwumerije (Senate Member) has at one time described it as being forced on the MDAs without consulting them, it was not done in isolation as the MDAs had inputs in the process.
He also pointed out that, the key performance indicators (KPIs) developed by the National Planning Commission for the MDAs are all part of the wider consultations which the National Planning Commission, the Federal Ministry of Finance and the Budget Office did worked on in the budgeting process.
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