N267bn in education funds lie idle as 70% of Nigerian children can’t read

…FG, the World Bank move to tighten budget planning, spending on schools, primary healthcare

…NPHCDA revitalises 3,504 PHCs, disburses N77.7bn to 8,309 facilities

By Joseph Erunke, Abuja

More than N267 billion in released basic education intervention funds remained unspent as of August 2026, while over N65 billion in counterpart funding was yet to be accessed by states, the federal government has disclosed, raising fresh concerns over the management of resources meant to improve learning outcomes across the country.

The revelation comes amid an alarming education crisis, with about 70 per cent of Nigerian children of primary school age unable to read and understand a simple text, according to the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC.

The figures have brought renewed attention to the disconnect between government spending commitments and the delivery of essential services, particularly as Nigeria continues to grapple with poor learning outcomes, inadequate educational infrastructure and gaps in access to quality primary healthcare.

Against this backdrop, the federal government, in partnership with the World Bank and other stakeholders, has moved to strengthen state-level budget planning and execution, insisting that public resources must be tied directly to clearly defined priorities and measurable results.

The intervention is being pursued under the Human Capital Opportunities for Prosperity and Equity–Governance Programme, HOPE-GOV, through a technical capacity-building workshop on Disbursement-Linked Indicator 2, DLI 2, which focuses on improving state budget planning and execution for basic education and primary healthcare.

Speaking at the workshop in Abuja on Monday, the Executive Secretary of UBEC, Dr Aisha Garba, who was represented by the commission’s Coordinator for HOPE-GOV and Director of Teacher Professional Development, Maryam Sani Dangaji, said the huge sums of unutilised funds underscored the need for a fundamental shift in how states planned, budgeted and spent money allocated to basic education.

She maintained that increasing allocations alone would not resolve the country’s education challenges unless governments strengthened accountability, improved expenditure efficiency and ensured that available resources translated into better learning outcomes.

“Spending more will not achieve this by itself; we must spend better,” she said, stressing that every naira spent on classrooms, instructional materials and teacher training must produce tangible improvements in children’s ability to read, write and count.

According to her, the challenge is not merely to provide more funding but to ensure that resources reach the schools and communities where they are most needed.

Under the HOPE-GOV framework, states are expected to prepare consolidated education plans, align their budgets with those plans and ensure that approved expenditure is implemented within established performance limits.

The approach is designed to strengthen the relationship between government priorities, budgetary allocations and actual service delivery, while encouraging states to deploy scarce public resources more efficiently.

Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning, Dr Deborah Odoh, said the quality of government spending depended largely on the strength of the systems through which public resources were planned, allocated and utilised.

She said budgeting must not be treated as an isolated administrative exercise but as the financial expression of government priorities and development plans.

Odoh, who declared the workshop open, said the preparation of the 2027 fiscal-year budgets offered states an opportunity to address weaknesses in their planning and expenditure processes.

According to her, state development plans, sector policies, annual operational plans and consolidated workplans must be properly linked to annual budgets to ensure that allocations reflect identified needs and realistic implementation costs.

For primary healthcare, she said, annual operational plans should provide the basis for identifying and prioritising expenditure, while the annual consolidated work plans for basic education should establish a clear connection between sector priorities and budget allocations.

She explained that the workshop was designed as a practical exercise in which participating states would review their actual plans, workplans, budgets and resource information rather than merely receive theoretical presentations.

The sessions would examine how sector priorities were costed and reflected in budgets, how expenditure was classified under the National Chart of Accounts, and how proposed activities could be reconciled with available resources and budget ceilings.

Odoh emphasised that the objective was not for the Federal Government or technical experts to prepare state budgets but to strengthen the capacity of state institutions to manage their own planning and budgeting processes effectively.

She urged participating states to identify existing weaknesses, agree on corrective measures and establish clear responsibilities and implementation timelines.

The permanent secretary added that technical support would continue after the workshop to help states address outstanding issues and sustain the alignment of their plans and budgets.

National Coordinator of the HOPE-GOV Programme, Dr Assad Hassan, said the initiative was intended to move states beyond preparing development plans to ensuring that those plans translated into funded priorities and measurable outcomes.

He said the workshop represented an important step towards strengthening the institutional systems required to improve the delivery of basic education and primary healthcare.

“We are here to move from plans to priorities, from priorities to budgets, and from budgets to results,” Hassan said.

According to him, meaningful improvements in education and healthcare cannot be achieved simply by increasing government expenditure without addressing weaknesses in planning, budgeting, implementation and accountability.

He said the workshop would help states identify gaps in their existing systems, improve the alignment of annual operational plans and consolidated workplans with their 2027 budgets, and strengthen the use of programme-based budgeting.

Other areas of focus include project prioritisation, costing, mapping and geo-tagging, as well as reconciling sector plans with available fiscal resources.

Hassan said the ultimate objective was to ensure that every participating state left the exercise with a clearer understanding of the reforms required and practical steps for implementing them.

The Nigeria Governors’ Forum Secretariat also stressed the need for state governments to ensure that their budgetary commitments to education and primary healthcare translated into services that citizens could access.

Dr Chinekwu Oreh, a senior health specialist and representative of the secretariat’s Executive Director of Programmes and Partnerships, said the success of government policies in the two sectors depended on realistic plans, credible budgets and the timely release and utilisation of approved funds.

She noted that primary healthcare facilities and classrooms were where government commitments to human capital development ultimately became visible to citizens.

Under DLI 2, she explained, state was expected to ensure that approved budgets for basic education and primary healthcare were based on their consolidated work plans and that expenditure remained within established budget performance limits.

She said the ongoing 2027 budget preparation process provided an opportunity for states to address weaknesses identified during the programme’s Year Zero verification.

Oreh added that the Nigeria Governors’ Forum would continue to support states through technical assistance and peer learning aimed at improving budget credibility, strengthening implementation and promoting timely publication of transparent fiscal information.

She urged state officials to use the workshop to develop practical solutions that could be implemented immediately, rather than treat it as another routine capacity-building exercise.

While education financing remains a major concern, the National Primary Health Care Development Agency, NPHCDA, outlined ongoing efforts to strengthen primary healthcare delivery through improved infrastructure, financing, workforce development and accountability.

The agency’s Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer, Dr Muyi Aina, represented by the HOPE-PHC focal person, Onesirosan Omawumi Daibo, said 3,504 primary healthcare centres had been revitalised, with work continuing at another 930 facilities.

The intervention forms part of the Federal Government’s target of revitalising 17,600 primary healthcare facilities over four years.

Aina also disclosed that N77.7 billion had been disbursed through the Basic Health Care Provision Fund, BHCPF, to 8,309 primary healthcare facilities across the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory between 2023 and the first quarter of 2026.

According to him, the agency is expanding coverage towards a target of 13,521 facilities under the fund.

To improve financial accountability, the agency has deployed its BHCPF Financial Management System application in 5,071 facilities across 21 states, while 774 performance and financial management officers have been deployed across local government areas to monitor performance and financial management at facility level.

On workforce development, Aina said 78,054 frontline health workers had been trained towards a four-year target of 120,000.

He added that the agency had incentivised the recruitment of 19,758 skilled birth attendants across 22 states and 3,876 community-based health workers across 10 states.

Funding had also been secured to support the recruitment of an additional 3,629 skilled birth attendants and 11,200 community-based health workers in 26 states and the FCT, he said.

Aina stressed that sustainable improvements in primary healthcare required adequate financing, costed workplans, effective implementation and accountability for results.

He urged state governments to ensure that their 2027 budgets provided for functional primary healthcare facilities, adequately trained personnel, essential medicines, basic equipment and improved access to services for mothers, children and other vulnerable populations.

To address weaknesses in basic education planning and financing, UBEC said it was implementing reforms intended to improve the identification of needs, allocation of resources and monitoring of expenditure.

Among the measures are the revamped Basic Education Action Plan, BEAP, a digital Basic Education Action Plan Management System, BEAPMS, revised UBE Intervention Fund Guidelines and a 10-year strategic roadmap covering 2026 to 2035.

The BEAP is designed to provide states with a consolidated framework for identifying and prioritising their basic education needs, while BEAPMS will support digital submission of plans, tracking of fund utilisation and publication of information on resources accessed by states from UBEC.

The revised intervention fund guidelines are intended to enable states to direct resources towards areas of greatest need, rather than concentrating only on the construction of new classrooms.

UBEC also called on state officials to strengthen coordination among ministries of education, finance, budget and planning, state universal basic education boards and local government education authorities.

It urged states to monitor budget execution quarterly, publish relevant documents promptly and ensure that their budgets reflected approved sector plans.

The commission said it was prepared to provide technical assistance through its desk officers, BEAPMS team and planning experts.

The workshop brings together state officials responsible for budget and planning, primary healthcare, basic education and programme coordination, alongside representatives of the Federal Ministry of Finance, NPHCDA, UBEC, the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, the World Bank and other technical partners.

The World Bank-supported HOPE-GOV programme operates alongside related interventions focused on primary healthcare and basic education, with the broader objective of strengthening public resource management and improving human capital outcomes.