Stolen Chalk, Starved Teachers: Where Nigeria’s Education Billions Really Go – By Fẹ́mi Akínṣọlá
Every year Nigeria budgets billions for education. Every year teachers are told there is no money. Both statements cannot be true, and the gap between them is where the real scandal lies. It is not simply that teachers are underpaid. It is that the money meant to pay them, train them, equip their classrooms and give them a dignified retirement is being intercepted, diverted and squandered by the very people who make grand speeches about education. The poverty of Nigeria’s teachers is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made catastrophe, engineered by corruption and sustained by a political class that has perfected the art of stealing from children.
Consider the scale of the theft. Transparency International has reported that sixty six per cent of money allocated to education is stolen by corrupt officials. Read that again. Two thirds of every naira budgeted for education never reaches a classroom, a textbook or a teacher’s salary. When the Universal Basic Education Commission revealed that 250 billion naira in matching grants was sitting unutilised in State Universal Basic Education Boards across thirty six states and the FCT, it was not announcing a surplus. It was confessing systemic failure. UBEC Executive Secretary Dr Aisha Garba identified the culprits with clinical precision: slow access of funds, slow utilisation, non compliance with utilisation guidelines, outright diversion and non adherence to approved action plans. These are bureaucratic euphemisms for a simple truth. Money meant for children is treated as a slush fund for political patronage.
The case of Kwara State illustrates the rot. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has been prosecuting a former governor over alleged diversion of 5.78 billion naira in UBEC funds. An EFCC witness testified that the money was spent on civil service salaries, loans and road projects, expenditures that had nothing to do with basic education. In another instance, the House of Representatives Public Accounts Committee queried the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation over an alleged 15 billion naira withdrawal from UBEC’s account. These are not isolated incidents of mismanagement. They are the operating manual of a system that treats education budgets as loot.
This theft has direct victims. When funds are diverted, the first casualties are teachers whose salaries depend on them. Matching grants that should improve infrastructure and teaching conditions are routed to political projects, leaving schools without facilities and teachers without tools. The 250 billion naira unutilised by SUBEBs is not a case of inability to spend. It is refusal to spend on education because political returns are too low. Governors and local government chairmen prefer projects that can be commissioned with fanfare and kickbacks, not the unglamorous work of paying teachers a living wage.
The constitutional confusion around teacher salaries has made theft easier. The Supreme Court judgment of 2002 placed primary education under state governments, but subsequent policy shifts and the 2024 local government autonomy judgment created a legal quagmire. The Kwara State House of Assembly has called for a National Teachers Service Commission to make teachers’ salaries a first line charge, a recognition that the current arrangement leaves teachers at the mercy of councils that are either insolvent or corrupt. The Nigeria Union of Teachers has warned that local government autonomy will impede smooth payment of salaries, pointing out that primary school teachers have already gone through agony under local councils. The 2024 Supreme Court judgment affirming financial autonomy for 774 local government areas means governors can no longer control council funds. By extension, councils must now take full responsibility for teachers’ salaries. But many councils are more corrupt than the governors who previously controlled them. Former Governor Chris Ngige, who has occupied both positions, has publicly stated that local government chairmen are more corrupt than governors.
While politicians divert funds, teachers pay the price. In Abuja, teachers were forced to strike for six months because area councils refused to implement the seventy thousand naira minimum wage despite increased allocations. Schools remained shut from February 2025 and parents staged solidarity protests. The FCT Minister expressed frustration, saying funds had been released but his hands were tied when it came to disciplining non compliant chairmen. Money is released, money is received, yet teachers are not paid and no one is held accountable.
And when teachers do seek accountability, their own leaders often betray them. Too often union leaders trade collective pain for juicy political appointments, board memberships and quiet settlements. Strikes are called, teachers stay home for months without pay, and deals are struck behind closed doors while salaries remain unpaid and allowances remain on paper. The ordinary teacher in Ibarapa, Gashua or Arochukwu bears the cost, while gains are measured in positions for leaders, not dignity for members.
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The human cost is borne disproportionately by women. Primary and private school teaching is dominated by women, many widows and single mothers, earning fifteen to forty thousand naira with no maternity protection or health cover. A teacher with sixteen years experience in Rivers State, teaching four subjects across six classes, earns forty thousand naira, below minimum wage. In many private schools, pay is fifteen thousand naira. These are not exceptions. They are the norm. These teachers buy chalk, print questions and use personal data to teach, subsidising the system with their own poverty.
The consequences go far beyond individual hardship. Experts have warned that the teacher crisis is a national emergency. With over eighty nine per cent of Nigerian children experiencing learning poverty, the country is producing a generation without foundational skills. Many public primary and secondary teachers earn fifty to eighty five thousand naira monthly, barely enough for living expenses in major cities. Attrition is catastrophic. In Niger State, exits reached 47.5 per cent, while Bayelsa recorded 14.2 per cent over recent multi year periods. UNESCO estimates Nigeria needs to recruit 250,000 new teachers annually to meet enrolment demands, yet young graduates avoid the profession. When a country cannot retain teachers, it cannot educate children. When it cannot educate children, it cannot build a future.
The comparison with other African nations is humiliating. A Nigerian professor earns about 535,000 naira monthly, about 4,400 dollars annually, while a South African professor takes home the equivalent of 6.99 million naira monthly, more than thirteen times higher. Kenya pays its professors 48,000 dollars per annum, Uganda 50,595 dollars, and even smaller economies such as Eswatini, Lesotho and Gabon pay significantly better. A former Vice Chancellor of the University of Ibadan put it bluntly: a nation that impoverishes its teachers undermines its future.
The excuses are tired and dishonest. Governments speak of economic constraints and competing priorities, yet find billions for luxury vehicles, foreign trips and maintenance of a bloated political class. The 290 billion naira shortfall in federal budget allocations for teacher salaries reported in 2025 is not scarcity. It is misplaced priority. When a government allocates less than one per cent of GDP to education while officials live in obscene luxury, it is not facing a crisis. It is making a choice.
The solutions are not complicated but they require political courage. First, ring fence education funds. Matching grants sitting in SUBEB accounts must be released and spent according to guidelines, with strict penalties for governors and chairmen who divert or hoard them. Second, establish the National Teachers Service Commission to make teachers’ salaries a first line charge, paid before any other expenditure. Third, clarify constitutional responsibility for salaries. The 2002 Supreme Court judgment must be respected or the constitution amended to create a dedicated funding stream that cannot be diverted. Fourth, empower the EFCC and other anti corruption agencies to prosecute officials who steal education funds with the same vigour applied to internet fraudsters. When a governor diverts 5.78 billion naira meant for basic education, he is not just committing a financial crime. He is stealing the future of millions of children. Fifth, reform union accountability, so leaders cannot trade welfare for appointments and private teachers can unionise without fear of dismissal.
The teachers of Nigeria are not asking for charity. They are asking for money already allocated to them. They are asking for matching grants meant to improve their schools. They are asking for salaries budgeted, approved, released and then vanished into pockets of people who have never stood before a classroom. They are asking for a nation that does not treat education of its children as a business opportunity for the politically connected. The question is not whether Nigeria can afford to pay its teachers. The question is whether Nigeria can afford to keep stealing from them. For the sake of every child in every classroom, the answer must be no.
