The Honourable Minister of Education, Dr. Maruf Tunji Alausa, CON, has reaffirmed that investing in the education of women and girls remains the most effective way to break the cycle of poverty and drive national development.
Speaking at a high-level policy summit in Abuja on September 4, Dr. Alausa stressed that educated women are more likely to secure employment, educate their children, and uplift entire communities.
He highlighted several ongoing government interventions, including vocational and technical education programmes, the Nigeria for Women Project—a $1.2 billion World Bank initiative currently active in 21 states—and the forthcoming Flow with Confidence project, championed by the First Lady, to help keep girls in school. Other measures, he noted, include the establishment of mega-schools, scholarship schemes, and the distribution of learning materials in states such as Edo and Gombe.
Dr. Alausa also announced curriculum reforms that will reduce the number of primary school subjects from over 20 to between six and nine starting with the 2025/2026 academic session. According to him, the reforms aim to ease academic pressure on pupils and better align learning outcomes with real-world skills.
The Honourable Minister of Women Affairs, Hajia Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim, in her remarks, stressed that closing Nigeria’s gender gap could inject as much as $229 billion into the national economy by 2030. She cited ongoing gender-sensitive reforms in Adamawa, Rivers, and Niger States as examples of progress.
Chairman of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG), Mr. Olaniyi Yusuf, called for bold, practical action beyond dialogue, while keynote speaker Oley Dibba-Wadda urged Africans to reclaim their stories and identities through technology.
Mr. Udeme Ufot, Chairman of the Policy Innovation Centre (PIC), described the summit as a critical space for shaping transformative policy. He revealed that its outcomes would be documented in The Purple Book—a roadmap designed to guide reform and ensure accountability.
