EKITI ABDUCTION: WE CALL FOR IMPROVED SECURITY OF STUDENTS AND THE MASSES AT LARGE

PRESS STATEMENT OF THE SPEC ON EKITI STUDENTS’ ABDUCTION

KIDNAP OF EKITI SCHOOL CHILDREN; AGAIN, A STRONG CALL FOR IMPROVED SECURITY OF STUDENTS AND THE MASSES AT LARGE

 

• – Calls For The Immediate Release Of The School Children.
• – Education Is Not And Can Not Be In The Bush.
• – For A Probe Of The Billions Of Naira Allocated To The Safe-School Initiative
• – We Will Go To Court If Any More School Child is Abducted

 

The SAVE PUBLIC EDUCATION CAMPAIGN, NIGERIA received with great pain and condemn in strongest terms, the news of the Abduction of Primary School Children in Ekiti State on 30th January 2023, on their way back home from school.

 

This is yet another painful attack on, and setback for, Education in not just Ekiti State, but the Country as a whole.

 

This latest attack again brings to the fore, the precarious conditions surrounding School Children’s safety in the Country and the insufficiency of efforts by concerned Authorities in this regard. As of the last count, over 3,500 Students have been kidnapped from or around their School places in Nigeria in the last 4 years, while many Teachers have also suffered a similar fate in the process. This is totally unacceptable as this violates the Children’s Right to Education, Right to Life, as well as Right to Freedom from Torture and other indignified Treatments, amongst others, as enshrined in the Child Rights Act and the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

 

Only recently, the Ministry of Education as well as the Nigeria Civil Defence Corps NSCDC announced the Roll-out of a Scheme and Machinery they said would safeguard Schools and end the abduction of School Children across the Country; barely few months into the said Scheme, we are confronted with yet another appalling School -kids’ abduction, pointing to glaring ineffectiveness of the touted Safe-School Initiative Machinery, despite the Billions of Naira appropriated to it. This is as worrisome as it is unacceptable as it will further scare Parents/Guardians and Children away from Schools thereby worsening the out-of-school Children epidemic threatening the Country. Presently, as a pointer to this, all Schools in Ekiti State are presently shut with Children all at home.

 

The SAVE PUBLIC EDUCATION CAMPAIGN strongly calls for the immediate and unconditional release of these abducted School Children.

We demand that the Government, whose primary duty is to ensure the protection of the Lives of the Citizenry, promptly rise to this responsibility and ensure the safe return of those Kids and their Teachers.

 

The Ministry of Education must do more to oversight safety nets and processes in place for school Children attending Schools, while Security Agencies particularly, the NSCDC where the Safe-School Initiative has primarily been domiciled, must do all that is necessary to ensure that no child leaves home for School and ends up in the Bush as Bush is neither Classroom nor home.

 

The SAVE PUBLIC EDUCATION CAMPAIGN does not mince words to state that we demand Action in these regards as we will promptly approach Court to hold the relevant Authorities to account and enforce the Rights of Children should these intolerable acts persist and School Children continue to be abducted.

 

 

Signed;

Comrade Vivian Bello – Convener, Save-Public-Education Campaign.