From Sola Ojo, Kaduna
National Commission for Nomadic Education (NCNE) has linked the increase in the figure of out-of-school children from 10.5 million in 2021 to 18.5 million in 2022 to the general insecurity in the country.
Specifically, the commission highlighted banditry, kidnapping, insurgency and early marriage in the northwestern part of the country as chief setbacks to the efforts by government and development partners to reduce the alarming trend ab initio.
Executive Secretary of NCNE, Prof. Bashir Usman, stated this while speaking at a capacity-building training for members of School-Based Management Committees (SBMCs) and Mothers’ Associations (MAs) from northwestern states on combating the menace of out-of-school children in Kaduna alerted that if the trend goes unchecked, it may worsen the security situation in the region and the country at large.
He lamented that 3.5 million of the 18.5 million children are from the nomadic background.
The academician, who spoke through the commission’s director of quality assurance, Mr. Akin Akinyosoye, said the issue of out-of-school children has been one of the major challenges in the implementation of Nomadic Education Programme (NEP) in Nigeria.
He said: In 2022, UNICEF reported that Nigeria has 18.5 Million children that are out of school. This figure is quite high when compared with 2021 estimates that were put at 10.5 Million which puts Africa’s most populous country’s out-of-school children to be on an emergency frequency. Alarmingly, UNICEF posits that 60
percent of the 18.5 Million O0SC in Nigeria are girls.
“This could be worse in the North-West zone comprising of Jigawa, Kaduna, Katsina, Sokoto, Zamfara and Kebbi states which are adversely affected by kidnapping, banditry, insurgency, early marriage, hence the increased number of out of school children in the zone. The prevalence of out-of-school children could exacerbate the worsening security situation in the zone.
“Similarly, it has been estimated that out of the 18.5 million out-of-school children in Nigeria, 3.5 Million children are from the nomadic background. However, the issue of out-of-school children has been one of the major challenges in the implementation of Nomadic Education Programme (NEP) in Nigeria. While the commission has adopted various strategies to ensure that this population of nomadic children return to school, part of this effort is to build the capacity of members of School-Based Management Committees (SBMC) and Mothers Associations (MA) to serve as foot soldiers in boosting the effort of the commission toward reducing the number of Out-Of-School Children (00SC) in their communities. This effort is also aimed to educate them on their roles and responsibilities in ensuring effective and efficient management of nomadic schools.
“It is also to make the members of SBMC and MA alive to their roles and responsibilities in creating working synergy between schools, communities, local government education authorities, traditional rulers, civil societies, state educational agencies and all other stakeholders towards the development of nomadic schools. This we hope will encourage a harmonious working relationship
between the schools and communities thereby creating a conducive environment for effective teaching and learning and optimum utilisation of learning resources in nomadic schools.”
Earlier, the director of social mobilisation and women developed of the commission, Dr. Fidelis Idoko, said the SBMCs and MAs are expected to monitor the working of schools, prepare and recommend school development plans and monitor the utilisation of grants received from the government.
Idoko further listed their function to include mobilisation of persons and resources for the greater participation of the people and good governance of the schools of the schools.
According to him, the trainees are expected to cover 30 school communities spread across 10 per senatorial zone.
“You are expected to train a minimum of 20 members of SBMCs and MAs in each community. We hope that a minimum of 4, 200 members of SBMCs and MAs will be trained across the seven states to form the foot soldiers in combating the prevalence of out-of-school children in the zone,” he added.