As part of the Justice for Africa campaign, this report serves as a crucial tool for understanding how global injustices continue to leave Africa’s young people behind in education, despite promises made under the Sustainable Development Goals.
In the 48 years since the Soweto Uprising, which is remembered annually on the Day of the African Child, the disparity between education budgets in Africa and those of its former colonizers has widened 110 times. This alarming gap continues to grow despite global commitments to provide equitable access to education. Shockingly, in some sub-Saharan African countries, education spending per child has halved since 1976.
The report sheds light on the systemic global forces driving these inequalities, examining issues like tax injustice, crippling debt, broken aid promises, and the failure to deliver on climate financing. These factors, combined with discriminatory decision-making structures in global governance, have deepened the challenges African youth face in accessing quality education.
