The Federal Govern­ment on Thursday ordered the Nige­rian Educational Research and Development Coun­cil (NERDC) to sepa­rate Christian Religious Knowledge (CRK) from Islamic Religious Knowl­edge (IRK) as subject in the nation’s basic education curriculum.

Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, who made this known dur­ing a meeting with states education commissioners and other stakeholders from all parts of the coun­try, said the move became necessary following the various complaints by Ni­gerians, especially from the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN).

Represented by the Min­ister of State for Education, Prof. Anthony Anwukah, Adamu said the merging of the two subjects was not carried out by the present administration as being speculated, adding that it was done by the previous government to reduce the number of subjects offered in primary and secondary schools.

“There is this contro­versy over the merger of CRK and IRK in the school curriculum. There were complaints by parents that children were overloaded with so many subjects and the recommendation then was to merge one or two subjects. Unfortunately, water and oil were merged together and it is not work­ing. So, to save ourselves the agony, the two subjects should be separated. We push that to the NERDC.”

He said the meeting with the stakeholders was part of the ongoing efforts to collaborate with all tiers of government in the imple­mentation of the Sustain­able Development Goals 4 (SDG4). The minister said Nige­ria has selected the Goal 4 of the SDGs, which empha­sises inclusive and quality education for all and pro­motion of lifelong learn­ing, for implementation in view of the importance of education as a fulcrum to national development. While restating the com­mitment of the Federal Government to revamp­ing the education sector, Adamu expressed the commitment of govern­ment to do everything pos­sible to ensure the country achieves SDG 4 by 2030.

The Authority