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A new report has unearthed massive irregularities in the procurement of textbooks for public schools, with head teachers playing a key role in the racket. The fraud ranges from forged signatures, delivery of phantom books, overpricing and single-sourcing of suppliers by instructional materials selection committees at the school level. Education Cabinet Secretary recently said that though the government allocated Sh10 billion for books in the last three years, most schools did not have the materials. He estimated that the pupil-to-book ratio stood at 5:1 in primary schools.

The acting Dean of the Faculty of Education, Sokoto State University calls on the president to beam his search light on corruption in education for the purpose of a general overhaul, following his interest in the education sector demonstrated through his second-to-none budgetary provisions. Both corruption and the corrupt practices involved in anti-corruption politics in Nigeria are traceable to the value-free instructional practices in Nigerian schools. It takes a fraudulent and morally bankrupt teacher just a class or lesson to destroy through his or her value-free instructional practices whatever gains are recorded in the on-going anti-corruption project.

Education Cabinet Secretary has described the auditing system used in Kenyan schools as a “big joke” and a great let-down and accused auditors of colluding with headteachers to give favourable reports even when money has been lost. He also decried the inappropriate use of free learning cash and the distribution of government-purchased books in schools and described the system of assessing the performance of teachers as still substandard.