THE Federal Government says it has developed a national framework for addressing the menace of out-of-school children in Nigeria.
Director of Social Mobilization, Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Alhaji Bello Kagara, who made this known in Abuja lamented that the out-of-school children syndrome seems to have defied the various strategies put in place by government at several levels to address it.
He said this prompted the commission to look outwards for some practical result-oriented strategies.
It is estimated that Nigeria is currently home to over 10.5 million school age children who are not in school, with majority of them engaged in child labour.
Kagara said in addition to developing a national framework for addressing the syndrome, a programme was developed by the commission for engaging the E-9 countries on the out-of-school children.
E-9 countries are countries with highest number of illiterates in the world, of which Nigeria is a member.
He said considering that the northern Nigeria has the highest number of out-of-school children, a Northern Nigeria Traditional Leaders’ conference was held in October, 2018, to seek ways to end the menace.
According to him, both high and middle level advocacy and sensitisation on the utilisation of Universal Basic Education direct intervention projects and access and utilisation of the UBE matching grant were carried out in six geopolitical zones of the country.
He noted that the attention of UBEC is now focused on community engagement because that is where majority of basic education delivery activities really take place.
Kagara also revealed that the commission has finalised arrangements for the disbursement of 2017 Special Needs Education Support Funds to 160 private providers.
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