The Nigerian government has triggered a fierce national debate by abruptly cancelling a landmark policy promoting mother-tongue education, ordering all schools to immediately switch back to English in a move critics are slamming as a surrender of national identity and a premature failure.
Education Minister Tunji Alausa announced the immediate scrapping of the programme—launched just three years ago—citing “mass failure rates” in key national exams in regions that adopted it. “We have seen a mass failure rate… in those geo-political zones that adopted this mother tongue in an over-subscribed manner,” Alausa stated, defending the dramatic U-turn.
The decision has sparked immediate backlash from analysts and education advocates who argue the government abandoned a vital initiative instead of funding it.
Why It Matters
The government is making a conscious choice to prioritize global utility over local culture. By citing exam failures after a mere three years—a blink of an eye in educational reform—the administration is revealing a profound lack of commitment to the very idea of Nigerian-language education.
The proponents had a powerful case, backed by UN studies showing children learn best in their mother tongue. But the government refused to make the necessary investment in teacher training and materials, setting the policy up to fail. Now, they are using that engineered failure as an excuse to revert to the colonial norm.
This is a cultural capitulation. The real “mass failure” here isn’t in the exam results; it’s in the leadership’s willingness to abandon a project that would have required vision and patience to build a truly Nigerian educational system.
