Alieu Jobe was speaking in a recent interview with journalist Peter Gomez on his popular radio talk show ‘Coffee Time’ aired on West Coast Radio 92.1.
He informed that they established the organisation in 2023 and are ready to create awareness and to revisit the country’s education curriculum.
The curriculum department, he said, needs to revisit and engage stakeholders so as to gather their input into civic education and train teachers who are Gambian to teach the subject efficiently.
Quizzed as to why he embarked on the mass sensitisation on civic education, Jobe said that government through the Ministries of Basic and Secondary Education and Higher Education, Research Science and Technology has introduced civic education in high schools.
He disclosed that through his interaction with these students that study the programme he realised that the purpose has been defeated.
“If the students don’t know why they are doing the subject, I can tell you that most students are doing the subject just to pass the subject rather to know and understand the subject. The people that have introduce the civic education have not engage the students about the importance of the subject. Secondly, teachers were not adequately train to teach the students as most of the people teaching it are foreigners and do not know much about The Gambia.”
Thus, he observed that it will be difficult to teach students about patriotism, saying students do not have access to good materials about the subject to learn and know about the culture of the Gambia.
He also revealed that it is worthwhile to embark on a nationwide tour so as to discuss and educate people on what it means to be a Gambian and for them to make an informed decision when there is election. It is also important to cooperate with the state and ensure that we have good governance.
“I have interacted with the materials use in schools and most of them were written by foreigners and the ones written by Gambians are mostly copy and paste from other books outside The Gambia which defeat the purpose of civic education.”
