The Centre for Infrastructural and Technological Advancement for the Blind (CITAB) has criticised the Universal Basic Education Commission’s (UBEC) newly launched inclusive education standards, describing them as ineffective “paper promises” and “beautifully written documents” that fail to address the exclusion of children with disabilities from Nigerian classrooms.

In a statement released on Tuesday, CITAB chairman, Jolomi George Fenemigho, faulted UBEC for introducing the National Special and Inclusive Basic Education Minimum Standards, Implementation Guidelines, and Functional Difficulty Early Identification Tool without a clear enforcement framework.

“Nigeria has never suffered from a scarcity of beautifully written policy documents,” Mr Fenemigho wrote. “What we suffer from is an absolute lack of enforcement, accountability, and political will. Setting voluntary guidelines in Abuja while schools across Nigeria lock out disabled children is unacceptable. We need legally binding standards across both public and private sectors, backed by relentless annual inspections and severe penalties.”

He identified major lapses in the framework such as lack of “guaranteed supply pipeline for Braille materials, tactile aids, screen readers, mobility canes, and other essential assistive technologies.”

At issue was also the alleged failure of  State Universal Basic Education Boards (SUBEBs) to pay counterpart funds, which makes learning resources inaccessible to children with disabilities.

CITAB clamoured that Organisations of Persons with Disabilities (OPDs) be given a formal and independent role in monitoring schools and verifying progress on inclusion.

Mr Fenemigho made an advocacy for all disabled learners to share the same classrooms as their peers and that provisions b3 made for ramps, accessible toilets and safe transport systems.

According to him, identifying disability is mot enough but that the government must do better to improve the quality of the children’s lives.

“Identifying a visually impaired child without supplying Braille, audio, and digital tools merely logs their disability, it does not educate them. Equipping teachers with checklists while classrooms remain physically inaccessible and teachers are untrained is not inclusion; it is bureaucracy. Until accessibility guidelines carry the force of law, with immediate suspension awaiting any school that fails our children, these standards will remain paper promises,” he said.

CITAB urged the Federal Ministry of Education, UBEC, and state ministries of education to create a single national accessibility standard for all public and private basic schools and ring-fence funding for disability inclusion.