The Federal Government, in collaboration with the European Union (EU), has launched a National Programme Steering Committee (NPSC) to oversee the €40 million Education and Youth Empowerment in Northwest Nigeria (EYEPINN) initiative.
The program will begin implementation in Jigawa, Kano, and Sokoto States, focusing on addressing the issue of out-of-school children, enhancing teacher development, and promoting youth skills acquisition in the Northwest region.
The committee, led by the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, and co-chaired by the Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, Senator Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, will convene annually to provide strategic direction, with a secretariat managed by the EU Technical Assistance Team (EU-TAT).
They will also hold quarterly technical meetings to closely monitor progress.
During the inauguration in Abuja, the Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Education, Abel Enitan, praised the EU for its steadfast partnership and investment in Nigeria’s education sector, which has significantly improved access, equity, quality, and system resilience.
Represented by Dr. Usman Ejeh, Director of Poly Education and Allied Institutes, he stated, “The EYEPINN project is one of the most strategic interventions aimed at addressing the ongoing challenges of out-of-school children, teacher capacity development, safe learning environments, and youth skills acquisition in Nigeria’s Northwest region.
“The EU’s ongoing support through initiatives like EYEPINN and Expand, Integrate and Strengthen Systems (EISS) demonstrates a shared commitment to empowering our youth and ensuring that every child, regardless of gender or background, has the opportunity to learn and succeed.”
He emphasized the committee’s role in ensuring accountability and integrating results into national policies, adding, “The committee functions not only as an oversight platform but also as a forum for strategic dialogue to ensure that the efforts of all partners are coherent, complementary, and impactful. The success of EYEPINN relies on effective collaboration among federal, state, and local governments, alongside our international partners.
“We must ensure that every Euro invested leads to measurable outcomes, improved learning results, empowered teachers, safer schools, and a more resilient education system that leaves no child behind.”
In her comments, Leila Ben Amor Mathieu, Team Leader for Human Development at the European Union Delegation to Nigeria and ECOWAS, emphasized the program’s importance as the delegation’s first standalone education initiative. “This is the EU Delegation to Nigeria’s first project focused solely on education. It is our flagship project. We wanted it to be designed in alignment with the ministry and to meet the needs of the Nigerian people,” she remarked.
She reaffirmed the EU’s commitment to being a strong partner to Nigeria.
According to her the EU is committed to remaining a very strong partner to Nigeria, as shown in its commitment for the period of 2021-2027, she said, “We have about €800 million for that period only on national programmes, plus another several hundreds that benefit Nigeria, but out of regional programme windows.”
Buttressing the need for the project she said it aims to address existing gaps in basic education, adding, “This is a €40 million project that we fund through UNICEF, Plan International, DIME, and also some technical assistance provided to the ministry. We would have loved to add secondary education, but we stopped at basic education, in particular targeting out-of-school children, nomadic education. We worked with the Quranic schools.”
Confident that the project should start delivering results, she added: “So, now we should start to see results and be able to deliver results. We have our partners from the World Bank that are also in charge of checking the impact of what we do.”
UNICEF’s Chief of Education, Vanessa Lee, described the programme as timely, “It came at a critical time in Nigeria’s education reform progress to support both the Federal and the State Ministries of Education and Universal Basic Education Board (UBEB) and State Universal Basic Education Boards (SUBEBs) in transforming the education system.”
Stating UNICEF’s continued commitment to getting every child learning in Nigeria, she added, “We continue to lead and support in the area of digital data transformation, education financing, reducing the number of out-of-school children, especially through establishing integrated Quranic centres and learning centres, scaling up foundational literacy and numeracy with the government, and providing teachers with school-based professional learning and learning through play teacher professional learning.”
Country Director of Plan International, Dr. Charles Usie, lauding the EU’s broad support across Nigerian sectors, including education, health, said, “Today is a special day for the EU and for all of us because what this programme has done is actually to bring hope to a lot of children who probably will still have been left on the streets, with no support and with no help.”
Country Director, Save the Children International, Duncan Harvey, noted, “This is indeed an important step that will encourage and improve the leadership of the overall programme. Every child, no matter their status, no matter where they are living, no matter their gender, ability or disability, every child deserves the right to quality basic education.”
