Education: Why mother tongue policy failed in Nigeria,
…Hausa, Yoruba, Igbo part of the dilemma of heterogeneous languages
…Lack of teachers, materials, and others
…It is non-implementable — NUT
…It is educationally risky in Nigeria — Ayodele
By Adesina Wahab
When the National Council on Education, NCE, at its 69th meeting decided to cancel the policy on the use of Mother Tongue, MT, as the medium of instruction in Nigeria”s basic schools, many people saw it coming, given the peculiar nature and set-up of the country and how the heterogeneous nature of Nigeria would render the use of MT ineffective.
Members of the NCE include the Minister of Education, the Minister of State for Education, state commissioners for education, permanent secretaries, and directors from the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.
Others are representatives of examination bodies such as the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, the West African Examinations Council, WAEC, the National Examinations Council, NECO, the Nation’al Business and Technical Examinations Board, NABTEB, the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), the National Universities Commission, NUC and international bodies such as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and GIZ, among others.
With the preponderance of opinions against the continuation of the policy, a few expressed reservations about the stoppage of the policy, one of which is the Nigerian Academy of Letters, NAL.
The NAL, in a statement endorsed by the National President, Prof. Andrew Haruna, noted that the challenge facing Nigeria lies not in the existence of the policy, but in its effective implementation and called for the reversal of the cancellation of the policy.
What gave rise to Mother Tongue in Nigeria?
The late former Minister of Education, Prof. Babatunde Fafunwa and his team at the then University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, from 1970 to 1978, went on a research trial with primary schools pupils at St. Stephen’s Primary School Modakeke, Ife, to prove that the best language for good concept formation at a very tender age is the indigenous language. And Yoruba language was tested as a medium of passing information or instructions to the pupils.
The project was based on the premise that:
-The child will benefit culturally, socially, linguistically and cognitively.
-The child’s command of English will be improved if he is taught English as an entirely
separate subject by a specialist teacher through the six years.
The steps taken to achieve this objective included the designing of relevant primary school curriculum with appropriate teaching materials and using Yoruba as the medium of instruction throughout the six years of primary school while English was taught as a separate subject.
According to Fafunwa, primary school teachers were specially trained in the use of mother tongue for instruction.
There were regular intakes of primary one class in some selected primary schools, while some are regarded as experimental groups, others are controlled groups.
While for over two decades, the MT Policy was haphazardly implemented in some parts of the country, the expected impact was never made.
Was MT effective in the country?
To be able to fully grasp the dire situation of the country in relations to Poverty Learning, literacy and numeracy, analysing some data would be necessary, as Nigeria appears to be in a learning emergency.
With about 50.7 million children aged 7-14 at basic education level, nearly 37 million cannot read a simple sentence and as they suffer from what is globally known as Poverty Learning.
By Primary 6, only 39% can read at the expected level, and just 35% demonstrate basic numeracy, meaning three out of four learners do not have the foundational skills needed to progress, learn, or compete globally. The crisis is uneven across the country.
The United Nations International Children Emergency Fund, UNICEF, in 2023, gave a graphic detail of literacy and numeracy rates by geopolitical zone as follows:
Zone Literacy Numeracy
North West 9.4% 8.3%
North East. 12.7% 10.7%
North Central 24.3% 22.7%
South West. 45.8% 46.7%
South East 55.8% 52.0%
South South 37.0% 34.0%
This demonstrates that Nigeria’s children are facing a severe and uneven learning crisis, with some regions lagging far behind in both literacy and numeracy. The gap between schooling and actual learning reflects a system-wide decline in education quality.
Why was MT not effective in Nigeria?
Nigeria’s National Policy on Education (NPE 1977, 1981, 1998, 2004, 2007 and 2013) articulates that the mother tongue or language of the immediate community should be the language of instruction in pre-primary and lower primary education. This policy framework is theoretically sound, rooted in constructivist principles and aligned with international best practices.
However, gaps in implementation remain substantial. Some of the gaps are:
Linguistic Diversity: With over 500 indigenous languages spoken, Nigeria is one of the most linguistically diverse countries in the world and has English as an official language. While this richness offers cultural strength, it presents operational complexity in educational planning.
For example, a teacher posted or employed to work in a school (private/public) in the Northern part of Nigeria and who could not speak the local language, would not be able to implement the policy of using mother tongue. Likewise, someone from the North, East or South posted to any another region outside his place of origin, would not be able to teach learners because of language barrier.
Another example is the learners themselves that come from different backgrounds and who are in the same class, they would find it difficult to follow what is being taught and then there would be no inclusivity thereby depriving other students the opportunity to learn.
Policy implementation gaps
Despite a policy commitment to the use of mother tongue in early education, implementation remained inconsistent due to limited development of orthographies and learning materials in many Nigerian languages, as well as inadequate teacher training and deployment in multilingual pedagogies
There is also regional and social preferences for English as a medium of upward mobility;
insufficient funding and decentralization of curriculum and instructional design;
inequality amongst states in terms of over subscription and under subscription. The transition was very difficult in most of the states whereby teaching with mother tongue continued up to senior secondary school level. This made students to be at the disadvantaged side because at the end of the day, they all would have to write national examinations in English with their counterparts in other regions.
Digital divide and access to multilingual resources
The integration of digital platforms in education, particularly after the COVID-19 pandemic, has presented both opportunities and equity challenges. Most digital content is not yet available in local languages, reinforcing linguistic exclusion.
It is difficult to implement in a place like Nigeria — NUT
The Nigeria Union of Teachers, NUT, along with some other educationists, had previously faulted government’s attempts to implement the mother tongue policy, highlighting significant practical challenges and arguing that the primary issue is the overall quality of education, not the language of instruction itself.
The NUT’s position is less an ideological opposition to mother tongue education in principle and more a pragmatic concern about its feasibility and potential impact under current conditions. The union, in many presentations on the matter raised the following issues:
Lack of Qualified Teachers: There are insufficient numbers of teachers trained to teach in the multitude of indigenous Nigerian languages.
Absence of Learning Materials: There is a scarcity of developed instructional materials, textbooks, and resources in local languages.
Linguistic Diversity: Nigeria has hundreds of languages, making it difficult to implement a consistent mother tongue policy across different regions and even within the same community, as a classroom may have children from various linguistic backgrounds.
Focus on Core Issues: The union urged the government to address fundamental problems like poor quality teachers, inadequate infrastructure, and a lack of a conducive learning environment, rather than focusing solely on the language of instruction.
While emphasising the importance of the above issues, the Chairman of the Lagos State Wing of the NUT, Comrade Hassan Akintoye, told Saturday Vanguard that the policy is very difficult to implement in a society like Nigeria.
“To me, I didn’t see it really implemented in the first place, so, coming round to cancel it is of no effect.The reason behind the stoppage is sensible because of the heterogenous nature of our nation, which we make the policy not implementable especially in cosmopolitan cities.
“It is difficult to pick any of the dominant languages as a medium of teaching despite the prevalence of numerous minor languages. And if any of the dominant languages is picked for a particular area, it would not allow for the inclusion of other minor languages. Most of the states of the federation have numerous languages and countless dialects,” he said.
MT is educationally risky in Nigeria — Ayodele
The Chief Executive Officer of the Africa Brands Review, who is also the Director General of the African Principals Conference Initiative, Mr Joseph Ayodele, described the cancellation as not only necessary but sound economic correction.
“While international research and historic studies provide strong academic arguments for MT instruction, the practical, logistical and economic realities in Nigeria – a highly diverse and mobile nation – make the universal adoption of the policy financially untenable and educationally risky. The cancellation, therefore, is not a dismissal of expert opinion, but an effective adaptation of foreign policy concepts to fit local constraints,” he opined.
He listed some of the reasons that the policy should be cancelled to include: the catastrophic cost of linguistic diversity and scale, saying the presence of over 500 local languages could lead to unsustainable resources strain; the inadequacy of compromise as excluding some languages could be politically contentious and educationally inadequate.
Ayodele added that with the country characterised by high internal migration, the reality would create a massive, economically detrimental cost if the MT policy is followed.
“There is transfer trap. Let us consider the Social Return on Investment: A primary three child who started school in Owerri, Imo State, with Igbo Language as the means of instruction and now moves to Ibadan, Oyo State to start Primary Four in a Yoruba-speaking classroom. The student faces immediate severe learning loss, cognitive disruption and steep linguistic transition curve. This is not mere inconvenience, it is a direct impairment of human capital that requires remediation, extra resources and time – all representing wasted investment,” he said.
He also argued that the policy was an impediment to national unity and labour mobility.
He opined that the cancellation of the policy supported fiscal prudence, educational continuity, economic readiness among others.
It has not helped our education system — Michael
A retired Assistant Director in the Ministry of Education, Lagos State, Mr Femi Michael, with 35 years teaching experience, said the policy has not helped the country’s education system.
“It has not helped our education and is not working. Only a few are championing the cause because of personal benefits not because of national interest. The world is advancing through AI and there are some words that can’t be identified in local dialects.
“In the states which implemented it, the level of education has gone down. Some teachers cannot speak English and poverty learning is on the increase. Students write WASSCE, NECO exams and others in English as English is the official language in the country.
In those days, speaking vernacular in primary schools was punishable. If we teach babies in mother tongue, that is understandable, but not when they have grown up.
“In Nigeria, there are over 500 languages and numerous dialects. Even in some states, you have more than 10 distinct languages, how would they cope? However, if we insist on emphasising the three major languages of Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba, are we not suppressing others?”
What government can do —Experts
Ayodele, while speaking on what the government can do to implement an inclusive language-in-education policy that would empower all learners through languages, suggested policy renewal and harmonization.
“There is a need to review and harmonize existing language-in-education policies across federal, state, and local levels. This will include a clear roadmap for the use of English Language through basic and secondary levels.
“Teacher education institutions should focus on English Language on pedagogy into pre-service and in-service training. There should be targeted teacher training tailored towards ensuring foundational literacy and numeracy. This will be in partnerships with faculties of education, and curriculum agencies such as NERDC and UBEC.
“The Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC) and other relevant agencies must develop all instructions using English as a medium of teaching.
“Innovative technologies such as AI-based and digital storybooks should remain in English Language without translation. The Federal Ministry of Education should also support the digital learning content in English especially for foundational literacy.”
For Michael, there must be inclusion and equity through language as meaningful learning begins with understanding.
“No matter where the learners are being taught, education in a language they comprehend builds confidence, dignity, and agency. Thoughtful English-medium instruction ensures all learners can engage with the curriculum, perform in national examinations, and access jobs and opportunities fairly, reducing linguistic or regional exclusion,” he posited.
However, Saturday Vanguard gathered that the Federal Ministry of Education, in response to the development, is implementing a comprehensive reform package aimed at improving the quality of education and learning outcomes.
These include the review of pre-service teacher training, nationwide capacity building for teachers, school leaders, monitoring and evaluation officers, digital training with incentives, and the establishment of teacher Communities of Practice (CoP).
Other initiatives cover school grading, the Safe Schools Initiative, revised Universal Basic Education Commission’s guidelines for state-targeted support, results-based financing (P4R), and partnerships with private schools to reduce out-of-school children.
The post Education: Why mother tongue policy failed in Nigeria appeared first on Vanguard News.
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When the National Council on Education, NCE, at its 69th meeting decided to cancel the policy on the use of Mother Tongue, MT, as the medium of instruction in Nigeria”s basic schools, many people saw it coming, given the peculiar nature and set-up of the country and how the heterogeneous nature of Nigeria would render the use of MT ineffective.
The post Education: Why mother tongue policy failed in Nigeria appeared first on Vanguard News.
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