Chairman, Nigeria Union of Teachers NUT, Lagos State, Comrade Akintoye Hassan has expressed the need for making learners, teachers and others safe in schools. In a public forum, the Union leader said, most parents now take their children and wards to school in utter trepidation.
” Safety of lives and property is one of the main duties of the government and no one would say he is happy when he can not feel safe in his place of work or in a place he is expected to acquire knowledge to better his life. We want a better situation of things this year. We don’t want a repeat of those ugly and unfortunate incidence”.
It will be recalled that at the commencement of the new academic session last September, the United Nations International Children Emergency Fund, UNICEF, came out with a report that over one million pupils and students were afraid to go back to school because of the level of insecurity, especially in the northern part of Nige.ria
As we speak, Nigeria already holds the unenviable record of having the highest number of out of school children across the globe, about 13.5 million.
With over 1,500 students abducted and about a dozen killed, especially in northern part of Nigeria in 2021, stakeholders in the education sector are in a hurry to push the ugly incidents of 2021 away from their consciousness.
In all the incidence, both conventional and Islamic schools were not spared as bandits and kidnappers ravaged schools. Some of the affected schools include Government Science College, Kagara in Niger state, 27 students abducted, Government Girl’s Secondary School, Jangebe, Zamfara state, 317 abducted, Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation, Afaka, Kaduna State, 39 students kidnapped.
Salihu Tambo Islamic School, Tegina, Niger state was also attacked and 136 students abducted.
The list also included Nuhu Bamali Polytechnic, Zaria, Kaduna State. Federal Government College, Birni Yauri, Federal University of Agriculture, Makurdi , Benue State among others.
