OUT OF SCHOOL CHILDREN: REPS TARGET ENROLLMENT OF 14m OUT-OF-SCHOOL CHILDREN 23-09-23
By Sadiq Aminu The House of Representatives says it is working on a framework that will ensure that over 14 million out-of-school Nigerian children are back to schools.
The framework, which is in form of an intervention through the House Committee on Alternative Education, chaired by a member from Sokoto State Mr Almustapha Ibrahim Aliyu, will also see the out-of-school children trained with relevant skills to become productive members of the society.
The Lawmaker in a statement, stated that the intervention by the Green Chamber, under the leadership of the Speaker Dr Tajudeen Abbas targets addressing public education by tackling poverty and value gaps.
In partnership with relevant government agencies he said, the intervention aims at improving access to education for all Nigerian children in line with the aspirations of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs-4) on qualitative and inclusive education for all.
According to him, the project is tagged ‘Nigeria Mass Reduction of Out-of-School children and Youth Project’ (NIMPROP), and it is proposed to last for a period of four years.
Mr Aliyu observed that it would also significantly reduce the number of out-of-school children through non-formal accelerated education system and other alternative schooling programmes.
He added that the government agencies that the committee is working with include the National Commission of Almajiri and out-of-school children, the National Commission for Mass Literacy, Adult and Non-Formal Education and the National Commission for Nomadic Education.
Part of the initiative, he explained, is to ensure the significant reduction of poverty in the six geopolitical zones of the country.
“Based on the statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the Northeast leads in the poverty index with 71.86 percent of its population in poverty, followed by the Northwest with 64.84 percent, while the North Central has 42.70 percent. Others are: South East, 42.44%; South South, 21.28% and South West, 12.12%.
“But the intervention targets the reduction of poverty as follows: Northeast, 4 million people; North West, 3.4m people; North Central, 2.5m; South East, 3m; South South, 2.1m, and South West, 1.6m.
Aliyu said already, the committee had several engagements with the relevant agencies in the past week with favourable responses from them, adding that the necessary machinery has been put in place for the actualization of the intervention.