IN what is a departure from previous practice, the Tinubu Administration is making a spirited move to enable several State Governments receive hundreds of billions of Naira in federal funds dating back to 2020 through the Univeral Basic Education Fund, clearing a five year backlog.
Empowered Newswire reports that the plan by the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa is part of a broad reform agenda to revive basic education across the country through an innovative funding mechanism which aggregates critical data and statistics of how the funds can transform basic education in each of the over 30 states that has left the federal funds idle for years.
The new strategy developed by Dr. Tunji Alausa and endorsed by the President, according to a top presidency source, is to indicate to each State Governor how the funds can change the fortunes of primary education in terms of teacher training, buildings of classrooms, safe learning environments, and how out of school figures would be significantly reduced. And this would be specific, unique information for each of the states.
Actually, State Governors of relevant States have started receiving the communication from the Education Minister detailing the data of out-of-school situation and other basic education challenges in their states, explaining how the funds would dramatically transform the challenges.
The presidency source said the plan of the President is “to positively armtwist” the State governments to urgently access the Universal Basic Education funds running into hundreds of billions which several States often ignore on the excuse of inability to raise the matching funds.
In the past, while most states ignore the funds by not meeting up with the matching funds, the Federal Government too has simply remained laid back uninspired by the excuses and refusal of the States that don’t come up with their counterpart funding.
But the Aso Villa source said “the Education Minister came up with the plan to tease out the interests of the Governors by supplying data of how much transformation is possible with the funds and decided to communicate this directly to the affected Governors.
In a copy of such communication seen by Empowered Newswire addressed to the Ogun State Governor whose state is one of those who have not accessed the UBEC funds since 2020, the Education Minister wrote in a letter dated April 24, 2025 that Ogun State government is specifically entitled now to a total of N7B, 816, 600, 698.99K as unaccessed between 2020-2024 as UBE matching grant.
The letter tabulated the amounts due to the State since 2020 thus:
Ogun State
2020-N715, 074, 135.14k
2021 -N946, 646, 664.48k
2022-N1,204, 452, 353.76k
2023-N1,395,784, 959.14k
2024 -N3,554,642, 584.46k
To access the funds, the Minister urged Governor Dapo Abiodun to “please provide an equal amount of N7B, 816, 600, 698.99K being State Counterpart Fund in compliance with Section 11 Sub section 2 of the UBE ACT 2004 to enable State access the funds.”
The Minister who wrote a similar letter to all the Governors affected, then added the following to Governor Abiodun:
“Your Excellency, these funds are critical to expanding quality education in Ogun State by constructing new schools in underserved communities and addressing other gaps including the need for the rehabilitation of 5126 classrooms, construction of 1299 school fences, 996 toilets, 1016 boreholes, & training 14,772 teachers.
“These investments will significantly reduce the burden of 182,596 out of school children, increase primary and JSS enrolment from the current 79% & 59% and improve access to safe, effective learning environments. Additionally, they will help advance foundational literacy beyond the current 35%.”
It would be recalled that as at December 2024, 34 states and the Federal Capital Territory have yet to access the N263,043,551,250.30 Universal Basic Education matching grant for 2024.
Only Katsina and Kaduna states were the two states that had so far accessed the 2024 first and second quarters of their matching grant.
In February 2025, 9 states settled a cumulative debt of N37bn, enabling them to access their long-dormant basic education funds at the Universal Basic Education Commission.
According to data obtained from UBEC, as of January 2025, the nine states that had paid their counterpart funds include Borno, which cleared N3,554,642,564.46 for the first to fourth quarters of 2024, and Jigawa, which also settled the same amount for the same period.
Kano paid N1,777,321,282.23 for the first and second quarters of 2024, while Ondo cleared N3,554,642,564.46 for all four quarters.
Nasarawa matched that amount for the same period. Plateau settled N4,950,427,543.60, covering the first to fourth quarters of both 2023 and 2024. Akwa Ibom paid N3,554,642,564.46 for the full year, as did Bayelsa.
Katsina, meanwhile also, settled N1,777,321,282.23 for the first and second quarters of 2024.
Taking it back to December 2023, the N64 billion Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) fund meant to facilitate access to quality basic education could not be accessed by state governments.