Minister of Education Tunji Alausa, on Wednesday said that the country’s role in co-hosting an international fund-raising conference for global education marked a return to international leadership under President Bola Tinubu.
“This is a great day for education, and also a great day for our country, Nigeria,” Minister Alausa said after Nigeria and Italy co-hosted the Global Partnership for Education’s 2026-30 replenishment conference.
The conference aims to raise $5 billion for foundational education in more than 100 low-income and lower-middle-income countries.
The Education Minister told reporters in New York after the Multiply Possibility High-level event tagged, “A New Era for Education Financing” that the pledges announced by governments and development partners had put the initiative on course to meet the $5billion target.
The Global Partnership for Education (GPE), expects to deploy about $15 billion over the next five years when additional catalytic financing is included, Alausa said.
NewsQuest reports that the funding is intended to expand access to schooling, improve learning outcomes, support education infrastructure and strengthen the teaching workforce.
“Teachers are the ones that matter most as we build our education agenda in Nigeria,” Minister Alausa said.
“They also matter most as GPE continues to advance its core mission of supporting education where it is needed most.”
Minister Alausa cast Nigeria’s participation as a demonstration of President Tinubu’s effort to restore the country’s influence in international affairs after what he described as a prolonged period of diminished leadership.
“Nigeria is back on the center stage. President Bola Tinubu understands what leadership is all about,” he said.
Minister Alausa said the conference drew commitments from governments and institutions across North America, Europe, the Gulf States and Australia, including Canada, the U.K., France, Italy and the European Union.
He said several donors had pledged more than they did during the previous replenishment cycle, although he did not provide a country-by-country breakdown of the commitments.
The Minister thanked Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, President Tinubu and other international partners for their political backing.
He said the event reflected a shared commitment by Nigeria and Italy to put education higher on the development agenda.
Minister Alausa said the previous GPE replenishment cycle had affected nearly 750 million children worldwide.
Nigeria has received roughly $800 million in grant support since becoming a member of the partnership, but he said Nigeria’s decision to co-host the conference was not driven principally by an expectation of further funding.
“Nigeria co-hosted this replenishment cycle not because of what we have benefited. It is to show the world that we care, that President Bola Tinubu cares about education, and that Nigeria cares about education.”
He said President Tinubu accepted an invitation in January 2025 from Jakaya Kikwete, the former Tanzanian president who chairs the GPE board, to co-host the event with Ms. Meloni.
Minister Alausa said the President’s support further indicates Nigeria’s willingness to help advance education for children in poorer countries, including programmes focused on girls’ and boys’ access to schooling.
“The President is sitting in Nigeria, not only transforming the economy and various sectors in the country, but reaching out to over 100 countries. That is leadership,” Alausa noted.
Vice President Kashim Shettima also played a significant role in advancing Nigeria’s participation in the conference, Minister Alausa said.
He noted that the Vice President Shettima had joined the Italian foreign Minister at the United Nations General Assembly last year to launch preparations for the replenishment drive.
Vice President Shettima’s involvement, he said, demonstrated the administration’s sustained support for education and for President Tinubu’s wider economic-transformation agenda.
Vice President Shettimma in a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Communication Stanley Nkwocha, Nigeria and Italy have strengthened collaboration to implement the proposed GPE financing campaign.
He noted that President Tinubu said the GPE vision aligns with Nigeria’s agenda which aims at improving educational outcomes by investing in access as well as capacity building for teachers.
In his intervention, President Tinubu, in a video message, also commended stakeholders in the GPE for their efforts in accelerating education financing globally.
Vice President, Shettima, who represented President Tinubu at the global gathering, noted that education is an investment in Nigeria’s economic future, and productivity as well as the prosperity and stability of its citizens, stressing that it is not merely an expenses at the margins of the country’s development agenda.
“For Nigeria, education is not an expenditure at the margins of our development agenda. It is an investment in our economic future, national productivity, and the prosperity and stability of our people.
“Since President Bola Ahmed Tinubu assumed office in 2023, our Administration has substantially increased resources devoted to education, while pursuing reforms to strengthen basic education financing, expand foundational learning, and improve access to tertiary and technical education.
“Through the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, we are widening access to higher education, while strengthening the link between education, skills, employment and enterprise,” the statement said.
According to Shettima, while Nigeria is also looking beyond traditional budgetary allocations, President Tinubu has directed that liquid funds recovered by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, once legally cleared and free from litigation, be channelled to the Nigerian Education Loan Fund.
To carry out the President’s directive, he said the Federal Executive Council (FEC) recently approved consideration of unclaimed dividends and dormant funds for the same purpose, subject to the relevant legal requirements.
This, Senator Shettima explained, demonstrates the nation’s conviction that financing education needs mobilisation of every responsible and lawful domestic source available.
Citing Nigeria’s alliances with the World Bank and GPE through HOPE-EDU, the Nigerian Vice President underscored what international partnership could achieve, just as he said, “The programme is expected to reach approximately 29 million children and 500,000 teachers across Nigeria.”
He continued: “This is precisely why GPE matters. GPE does not replace national investment; it multiplies it. The ambition before us is to mobilise US$5 billion for GPE and, through that investment, unlock additional financing for education in partner countries.
‘Domestic resources must remain the anchor, complemented by development assistance, concessional finance, philanthropy and innovative financing.”
Senator Shettima further observed that although Nigeria is a young country whose growing population could become one of its greatest economic assets, adding that this is possible only if the nation’s “young people have access to quality education, relevant skills and meaningful opportunities.”
The answer to declining global aid, he pointed out, “must therefore be smarter multilateralism: using scarce international resources to leverage much larger investments.”
He urged participants at the high-level event to ensure that it is not merely a fundraising exercise, “but a renewed compact for human capital, bringing together national leadership, international partnership and responsible financing so that every child has the opportunity to learn, thrive and contribute to their country’s future.”
Expressing Nigeria’s appreciation to the Italian government and GPE for joining in the conversation on the future of education financing, Shettima said as co-hosts of the campaign, Nigeria is not participating merely to ask the international community to invest more in education but “to demonstrate that we are investing in education ourselves.”
Earlier in a video presentation, the Prime Minister of Italy Giorgia Meloni, praised President Tinubu’s leadership and Nigeria’s determination to improve educational outcomes across all levels.
He urged all partners in the global alliance to show greater commitment to reversing the trend in developing countries.
For her part, UN Deputy Secretary General, Dr Amina Mohammed, thanked all partners for the interest shown in the improvement of education financing in developing countries, noting that the changes sought by stakeholders should begin with the choices that governments make.
She called on International Finance Institutions to support committed countries in finding the fiscal spaces needed to improve educational outcomes, including capacity building for teachers whose motivation and training remain critical to achieving set objectives.
In the same vein, Chair of Board of Directors of GPE, Dr. Jakaya Kikwete, underscored the need for accelerating education financing, noting that the event was a reminder to the fact that education remained central to the attainment of human rights, security, and peace, among other benefits.
He stated that GPE is driven by the realities of the drop in development assistance in education amidst the widening financing gap and the fact that the world will increasingly depend on systems that deliver tangible and desirable outcomes
For her part, girls’ education activist, Malala Yousafzai, emphasised the need for collaboration in ideas and resources, stating that global partnerships tend to produce greater results and more impactful outcomes than isolated interventions by countries.
She urged all stakeholders, especially multilateral organisations and governments across the world, to commit more resources and efforts to gender equality in education and address specific needs of the girl child, especially in developing countries.
