An old news item about how private schools are folding up in Rwanda because public schools are doing very well resurfaced on the internet last week. Like every other progress Rwanda makes, Nigeria took a lot of criticism from those who compared both Nations. But just how similar is Nigeria to Rwanda?
Mostly credited to The Daily Nation, the report says private schools in Rwanda are distressed due to low patronage. It says proprietors are asking the government for support to keep their business going as the public schools have become so good, people no longer want to take their children to private schools.
The Rwanda government had started a 12 years educational policy which includes school feeding, the abolition of school fees and massive investment in building capacity and teaching infrastructure in public schools across the country.
An educated context
While Rwanda’s educational reforms have led to a lot of success, most of the schools being referred to are in the capital city of Kigali with less than a million people. On the whole, there are 1,575 schools in Rwanda. In comparison, Nigeria has over 87,000 primary schools alone, 58 times the number of schools in Rwanda.
There are also more pupils in Nigerian primary schools (24,422,918) than there are people in Rwanda as a whole (12,210,000). There are even more male pupils (13,302,269) in primary schools in Nigeria than there are people in Rwanda.
Big deal
Nigeria is 35 times bigger than Rwanda and has at least 150 million more people than Rwanda. There are more people in Lagos than in the whole of Rwanda. Nigerians have over 20% more children than the Rwandese do. Rwanda has a GDP per capita of $2,100, while in Nigeria, the GDP per capita is $5,900.
Despite the difference in size, Rwanda does not beat Nigeria to everything as is usually assumed. More Nigerians, by percentage of the population, have access to electricity than the Rwandese does. While 45% of Nigerians have access to electricity on average, just 21% of people in Rwanda have access to electricity. Taxes are also lower in Nigeria.
Hutu, Tutsi & 250 others
With just two major ethnic groups, Rwanda has seen a 4-year long civil war which emanated from the differences between the Hutu and the Tutsi. Nigeria on its part manages 250 ethnic groups, most of them with more people than almost all Rwandese tribes.
With an 85% Hutu population and a ban on talking about ethnicity, Rwanda is almost homogeneous. Reconciliation between the Hutu and Tutsi is at least 19 years old and so is Paul Kagame’s reign as President. Courtesy of a constitutional amendment, Kagame is serving a third term of 7 years.
In the space of time that Rwanda has had a Kagame Presidency, Nigeria had 4 Presidents largely influenced by regional and National stability considerations as captured in an increasingly standardized zoning system.
The Singapore Model
Rwanda’s 19 years old national government says it wants to make Rwanda the Singapore of Africa. Unlike Nigeria, this is being achieved by stability in leadership and the sidelining of democratic principles, just like Singapore. Singapore is the eight safest and third richest country in the world. It doubled its GDP in a space of ten years, moving from the third world to first world country in a short time. Like Rwanda, Singapore is not exactly perfectly democratic. It is rated 66 in the world and classified as a flawed democracy. Rwanda is categorized as Authoritarian despite voting and some element of democracy. It stands at 128 while Nigeria is at 108.
Just like Singapore which has laws that some say would not stand in a truly democratic country, Rwanda has become one of the cleanest countries in the world due to a ban on single-use plastics and plastic bags. For Singapore, it was chewing gum. There is also a strict and militarised environmental sanitation once a month.
Progressive case
Much of Rwanda’s accolade is gotten from the progress it has made considering where it is coming from. Just 25 years ago, the average Rwandese had a life expectancy of 28 years because of the civil war, today that number is 67 years, Nigeria has a life expectancy of 54 years.
It has also scored some points on its own with a 2.5 to 100,000 murder rate despite being around countries with rates as high as 13.6 murders per 100,000. Rwanda is the 15th fastest growing economy in the world, it is the 3rd in Africa.
Through a Made in Rwanda campaign, trade deficit was reduced by 36% while the value of total export was increased from $558 million to $943 million. These figures are dwarfed by Nigeria’s $27.1B on Crude Petroleum, $5.36B on Petroleum Gas, $741M on Cocoa Beans, $711M on Gold and $582M on Refined Petroleum. But it is the progress Rwanda is making that the world is talking about. So much so that there have been incidents of hotels being completely books in the country for seminars and workshops.
Rwanda in comparison to Nigeria is best understood by the fact that despite giant strides in economic development, Rwanda is still one of the top 20 poorest countries in the world and Nigeria is not even on that list despite being 35 times bigger and with over 150 million more people.
