Umar Mohammed Rigasa

From Senator Kaduna Central
Sen Lawal Adamu Usman

My speech at the Education World forum in London UK

Distinguished delegates, Excellencies, colleagues, ladies, and gentlemen, my name is Senator Lawal Adamu Usman. Chairman Senate Committee on Basic Education

I am deeply honoured to join you at this vital gathering today. I thank our hosts for convening us under a theme that could not be more relevant, titled, “Global Priorities, Local Realities: Delivering Equity in Education.”

This forum is more than an annual tradition. It is a global checkpoint. It reminds us that while the barriers to education may span continents, the solutions must be rooted in our local contexts, cultures, and communities.

I speak today not just as a Nigerian Senator but as someone who once walked through the streets of the city of Kaduna, clutching my schoolbag and dreaming of a better future.

That journey, like millions of others, defines the urgent work before us. According to UNESCO, only 17% of Sustainable Development Goals are on track.

With SDG4's quality education yardstick lagging behind significantly, with over 250 million children and young people out of school globally.

Two-thirds of children in low-income countries can not read a simple sentence by age 10.

More than half of the world’s out of school children live in sub-Saharan Africa.

The girl-child continues to face disproportionate obstacles in enrolment, retention, and completion of school.

This is not only a human rights crisis. It is an economic emergency! The collective failure to invest adequately in education could cost the global economy a humongous amount of resources in lost lifetime earnings by the year 2030.

Yet, education remains the most powerful multiplier. Every dollar invested in education yields nearly $20 in economic returns according to UNESCO’s Education Framework, 2030.

These statistics carry names, faces, and futures of Nigerian children. Today, more than 7.6 million Nigerian children are out of school, and girls make up over half of that number.

In our rural areas and conflict-affected communities, classrooms remain half-empty, not for lack of aspiration but due to systemic challenges.

Insecurity, poverty, gender inequality, and inadequate infrastructure are among the factors that militate against a smooth education process for children in Nigeria.

I would like to emphasise that we are not standing still. Nigeria has one of the youngest populations in the world.

Educating our youths is not merely an investment. It is an utmost priority.

That is why, in the Nigerian Senate, we are taking decisive legislative steps to secure our future through education.

I am glad to report that we have advanced the Basic Education Amendment Bill to its third reading. This pivotal legislation will strengthen compulsory education mandates, modernise curricula, improve teacher quality, and institutionalise gender equality in all learning environments.

In addition, the proposed amendments to the Universal Basic Education Act will hold governments accountable for absenteeism and school dropouts in Nigeria, ensuring education is not just a right but a national
Priority.

Together with our development partners and communities, we are removing long-standing barriers to education.

By engaging traditional and religious leaders, we are shifting mindsets around early marriages and girls’ schooling. These community voices provide another voice to the legislation we tirelessly offer the nation.

In collaboration with the World Bank, we are scaling the Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment, also known as AGILE, to all the 36 states of Nigeria, providing scholarships, life skills, and safer learning environments for teenage girls.

We have expanded school meal programmes and improved facilities, bringing schools physically and socially closer to desolate communities.

In partnership with state governments across Nigeria, we are rolling out solarpowered digital learning hubs in rural areas. These centres connect learners to the world deep into where roads and power lines do not reach.

Realistically speaking, a great percentage of primary schools globally do not have internet access.

The need for the expansion of internet service provision worldwide can never be over emphasised.

In Nigeria, we are bridging this gap with offline learning tools, including radio programmes, mobile apps, and pre-loaded tablets, thus ensuring no child is left behind even in rural areas.

Nigeria is ready to lead and to learn. We are open to accepting interested investors in our education sector from around the world, where private institutions can be established to complement our existing public school system. This will encourage competition and push underperforming institutions to step up.

Through the African Union, ECOWAS, and bilateral cooperations, we are strengthening both regional resilience and global collaboration. Our education agenda is guided by five core priorities:

1. To invest in teachers through recruitment, training, and retaining of qualified educators, because no system can rise above the quality of its teachers.

2. Expand Access: To make sure schools are accessible to children safely and with all infrastructural facilities that would encourage them to stay in achool.

3. Leverage Technology. Digital tools must narrow, not widen the equity gap. We, in Nigeria, are in the process of providing Smart Classrooms for Primary schools nationwide. An ambitious project prioritised by the current Nigerian President, Bola Ahmad Tinubu GCFR.

4. The funding shortfall for education, which runs into billions of dollars in developing nations, can not be closed by aid alone. Domestic investments must rise alongside renewed global support in order to enable governments of developing countries to meet the required standards.

5. Protect the Vulnerable: Children displaced by conflict, living with disabilities, or trapped by poverty must remain at the heart of our policies. A future worth fighting for.

I would love to end with a true story of young twins in Kaduna.

As it has been my passion, I have a foundation that supports education in my state of Kaduna. I was honoured to meet two young girls, Hassana and Hussaina, who are twins and attend Kaduna State University. These twins happened to fill the form provided on the portal I created for those who can not afford to pay their fees to fill.

My staff randomly called one of the young women and asked why she filled the form. Being part of the questions we ask in order to identify those who are eligible. The young girl answered, her sister and her are students of the institution and had lost hope of returning to school to the point that they had started making face masks and roasted peanuts as a means of sustenance before being informed of the portal.

My staff asked of their father? To his heartbreak, the young girl caught her breath and told him that her father was shot dead by kidnappers on his way to the Nigerian port city of Lagos on a business trip. The staff assured her that their fees would be the first he would pay. I eagerly signed off on the cheques when he told me their story. Such is the state of the situation of tens of thousands of Nigerians today. The Nigerian government, through the President's Renewed Hope Agenda, is trying as hard as possible to broaden th scope of education not just through physical structures but through the provision of security and the much needed teachers with adequate learning tools.

Thank you.

Distinguished Sen Lawal Adamu Usman (Mr LA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Education (Basic and Secondary), will represent the Nigerian Senate and join global education leaders at the Education World Forum 2025, scheduled to take place in London, United Kingdom, from Sunday, 18 May to Wednesday, 21 May.

During the forum, Senator Lawal will deliver a keynote address on the theme “Global Priorities, Local Realities: Delivering Equity in Education,” highlighting the role of legislative bodies in shaping and formulating inclusive and equitable education policies, ensuring adequate budgetary provisions for education, and exercising effective oversight of education implementation strategies.

At the event, the Senator will engage in high-level discussions and network with international education stakeholders and global leaders to explore strategic partnerships, exchange best practices in policy innovation, and advance collaborative legislative frameworks to enhance Nigeria’s basic and secondary education system.

These engagements align with the Senate’s broader legislative agenda of ensuring equitable, accessible, and quality education across the country.