Colonel Abdulwahab Ademola Lawal (Rtd), who is the Chairman of the Kwara State Education Trust Fund (KwaraETF), has disclosed that the focus of the Fund is to generate funds to assist the State Government in achieving its goals in the education sector.
Lawal, who stated this at an interactive session with journalists in Ilorin, the state capital, said: “We
assist the government in achieving the educational dreams and goals of the State across all levels of education, right from the Primary School to Secondary School and the University as well as Adult education. All strata of education are where we can assist in supporting the government,” adding that he is making consultation with education stakeholders in the state as well as drawing a 5-year action plan that will give direction to the activities of the Education Trust Fund.
He said: “I’m already in touch with the relevant stakeholders, people who I would say are respectable stakeholders who have a lot of experience to shed light and explain some of the things that need to be done as quickly as possible, and one of the things that came on board very quickly was for me to draw a plan, a development plan.
“We call it a five-year development plan to cover the areas of need after we have done needs assessment.”
He also noted that he is focusing on generating more funds through advocacy for grants within and outside the country rather than placing burden on the people.
Lawal, however, revealed that the Kwara State Governor, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, has given N100m as a take-off fund for KwaraETF, describing it as a noble and commendable gesture as he expressed optimism that the Governor would take the level of education in the State to a higher ranking among other states of the country.
Recalling his foray into the Nigerian Army, Lawal reiterated the importance of good leadership.
He said: “I joined the Nigerian Military through the Defence Academy in 1974 and was commissioned to the Nigerian Army infantry and in my over 22 years in the Military, I did a lot of combat, teaching, as well as staff work.
“In operation, I served during the Iran-Iraq War as part of the Military observer group, which lasted from September 1980 to August 1988. We finally resolved the conflict through mediation and field work. As a matter of fact, I earned the United Nations medal for Peace in 1989.
“I was also part of ECOMOG in Liberia, and we fought a lot of battles against Charles Taylor, who was then the head of the rebel group. We also fought a very long battle from Monrovia to Buchanan.
“I was there first as a Brigade Major and later as Battalion Commander and I was very much involved in the battle and it was quite an interesting military experience and I later ended up at Staff College, Jaji where I was teaching young Majors. We called it senior division staff college.
“I encountered a lot of challenges. War is not a child’s play because we are talking about life and death, and so my impression is that leadership needs to be right because if leadership is correct people will follow. You can imagine a young soldier. You are commanding him to go and face fire, he needs a lot of courage and inspiration from you in order to do exactly what you are asking him to do and that is leadership. You must project adequate leadership, you must project integrity, good character, and they will see you as a model to be emulated and followed.
“You must also be prepared to put your life on the line, which means when you order them to move forward, you are also moving with them. So, they will believe in you and be inspired by you. Loyalty is both ways: be loyal to them just as you demand loyalty from them. As it is with military leadership, so it is with leadership in every endeavour.”
He also spoke on how he was able to obtain a Doctorate degree despite not having a first degree.
He said: “Like I told you, my military background also included a lot of academics, having been a teacher at various levels at the school. At the military level, I taught at the young officer level up to captain, and then to major, and so on. So, that has been my character and faith. And so when I left service, I also continued in that line in terms of research and all that.
“A professor called me one day and told me that I should get properly integrated into the academics. He asked if I had a first degree, I said no, then he told me there are so many universities that once you bring your profile, the work you have done, they will assess you and fit you properly into some academic programmes curriculum, and some learning contract.
“So, I packaged my CV; what I have done in the past, the lectures I have been presenting, the papers I have been working on, and sent them to the university,
“They told me they could give me a degree. but I had to do a lot of work along that line. I said, fine, what do I need to do? He said, you have got to attend some seminars. You have got to repackage all this your knowledge, and for about one year or so, we will be doing seminars forth and back. We will join you with a class online, and then you will see how it goes.
“And that is what I was doing for about one year. I hopped into London to attend some seminars over there and then eventually, I got a master’s degree in public policy over a period of three years.
“At that time, there was a policy they called the Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP), which was introduced by former President Obasanjo. I did a study on the programme, and did a lot of analysis on it, after which I presented it and then the thesis was taken and accepted as a very good one, because I was highly critical of that PAP.
“You remember, Nigerians at the time the programme was introduced believed it was a good idea, but totally mismanaged, at that time. Party chairman, or a ward chairman of the ruling party, would just send a long list of people and say, these are the people that need to benefit from the programme. Thereafter they will send them to maybe a federal secretariat to get employment as a cleaner or messenger. They will never show up there but will receive their pay at the end of every month.
“After I wrote that paper, incidentally, I was vindicated and the vindication was simply that PAP was scrapped and they brought in the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) and of course, I also did some critique of NAPEP
“I also went back for my doctoral degree programme and I did that for another three years. This time around, it was on policy making in ECOWAS, and we called it the impact of structuralism, the society’s norms, your culture, how does it actually interfere into policy making, that is in ECOWAS, and after three years of seminars both physically in UK and on-line, I got my doctoral degree in policy analysis and we call ourselves “policy scientists.”
Lawal, who is the Director of Research at Savannah Centre for Diplomacy, Democracy, and Development, disclosed that the Centre is part of an advocacy at the United Nations to secure two permanent seats at the Security Council
“We are talking about the reform of the United Nations. For example, recently we were at the United Nations at the Summit of the Future where Savannah Centre presented a strong case for reforms including Africa having a seat. In fact, two seats, at the United Nations Security Council.
“You know, that is our demand and it is gaining ground and everybody is buying into it so that the future United Nations will have Africans seated on the Security Council. Not one, but two but the contention we are in now is whether we will also be given the veto power”, he said. In this advocacy Savannah Centre has hosted African scholars and stakeholders in a conference in Abuja and a follow up on at Nairobi. In fact Savannah Centre is the seat of the African Research Network Group working on the Africa we want and the UN we need and I am the Secretary General of the research network group.
He added that the Centre is also into training youths on diplomacy and mentorship, saying that “ So many universities are running courses on diplomacy and they come to our centre for internships and discussions on how to deepen their knowledge in diplomacy.”