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By Magnus Eze, Enugu
The Enugu State government is investigating allegations of bribery in determining books to be used in its primary and post-primary schools.
It has vowed to expose and prosecute those allegedly collecting money from authors and publishers whom they promise to get their books recommended for usage in the state.
The state government, however, declared that recommendation of books clearly follows prescribed steps every three years.
Commissioner for Education, Prof. Uche Eze, who spoke on the development, said no department of the ministry nor its agencies indulged in inducements to recommend books for schools.
According to him, the state government, ministry of education and all their agencies were embarrassed with reports of a purported lawyer, whom he said was using the name of the education ministry and agencies in duping unsuspecting authors and publishers.
Aside from taking due diligence in recommending books used in their school system, the commissioner stated that any payment for book review was usually sent into the government’s IGR account.
“When there is a call for book review, clear direction is given and it is always clearly written that whatever is to be paid must be paid into the government IGR account.
“After book submissions, subject experts are pooled to review the books and there is no book that is reviewed by one expert. A minimum of two experts must go through one book and make their individual recommendation and, based on their recommendations, the ministry will determine the textbooks in each subject area that will be used for a particular period of three years. This means that we do not review books every year, we review books every three years,” Eze said.
He also disclosed that the ministry publishes recommended textbooks and makes them available to stakeholders so that they will be properly guided, adding that the ministry goes further to monitor if the recommended books are the ones actually being used in the schools.
The commissioner explained: “So, when books are recommended, it’s then left for the end users and the schools to determine which of the books they will use in their own school. We don’t just recommend one text book, three to four or five text books could be recommended, but all of them must have met the requirements.
“The content of the book must address the content of the curriculum, the books must be clearly written and we have to ensure that the content is correct and that is why we invite experts, those who are really knowledgeable in the subjects to ensure that the books meet the requirements of the Nigeria Educational Research and Development Council that regulates books used in Nigeria schools.
“Therefore, for someone to say that for a book to be recommended, that somebody has to pay is what I don’t know. But from the story, the Anikem Foundation has no MoU with the Ministry of Education and there is no document from the Ministry of Education authorizing him to sell any book for the ministry and I have related with all agencies in my ministry and they all denied that they don’t have any agreement with Anikem Foundation to sell books and because no one gave him any written permission to sell books on behalf of anybody. For such a man to come and bring down the image of the state will not be tolerated and we will take appropriate action to deal with the matter.”
