Kicked out of school by fate: Why Nigeria’s 13.2m children are out of school

  Millions of Nigerian children of school age are currently not in school for different reasons.  In this report by  BAYO ALADE the children told their stories and how they were made to dump education for life on the streets by forces beyond their control.

NIGERIA is the most populous black nation on in the world. Ironically, it also has one of the largest number of out-of-school-children. The current UNICEF›s country report painted  a lurid image of Nigeria›s situation. “The huge population», the report states «has put pressure on the country’s resources, public services and infrastructure” and its under-15 population account for 45 per cent of the population.

According to current figures released last month, Nigeria now has 13.2 million out-of-school children, with 60 per cent of them in Northern Nigeria. Still, about 60 per cent of these out-of-school children are girls, a situation attributable to socio-cultural practices including withdrawal from school for marriage though some northern states now have law prohibiting such act.

All across the country out-of-school children could be found roaming the streets engaging in different forms of labour or engaging in one form of economic activity or the other just to fend for themselves or siblings as the case sometime is. And when Sunday Tribune sought to know the reasons why they were not in school, these young adults have their different stories to tell.

Usman Adiyo from Kano State is one of them. He used to attend Hamidu Primary School in Kano, but has been forced to drop out. According to him, his father had dumped the family a long time back for God-knows-where. With no relative to turn to, he is now left to take care of his mother and his siblings.  Life could not be more difficult than what both mother and son are now facing.

“There was no money to send me to school. I was unable to pay my exam fee and textbooks: N350 for exam and N3,000 for school fees. My mother searched for money, but we couldn’t get enough., So she, my mother, bought me this (cobbler’s) basket to do shoe repair to support myself and the family.

“I have made some saving and I’m still planning to go back to school. If I have up to N6,000, it should be enough to go back to school,” Usman explained brimming with hope as he spoke with Sunday Tribune.

Tosin Olusoji from Ibadan, Oyo State, is also out-of-school. According to him, money is the main reason for his not attending school. His parents could not afford the school fees required to be paid though he was in a public school. He said he would have loved to continue his education, but  had to quit in SS1 when his parents finally made it known to him that they could not continue to finance his education or support him.

“I left school when I was in SS1. After JS3, it was hard to pay for registration, PTA levies, and government approved fees. My dad was no more interested in sponsoring my education and my mother was also incapacitated financially.

“I began to learn barbing and after the first term in SS1, I decide to stop schooling. This world is all about making money and I only need to pray and trust God. If I have money in the future I may decide to continue but for now education is too expensive for the underprivileged,” Tosin said.

Omoniyin Ogunshola from Osun State shares Olusoji’s belief that ‘this world is about making it’ and so see school as a waste of time. For him being out-of-school is a choice and he is enjoying it.

“I personally don’t see school as anything,” he told Sunday Tribune. As far as he is concerned “money is the thing and even someone with no education is searching for money and those who went to school is also looking for money, so I have decided to work for money.”

Omoniyin was in school for seven years but stopped when he was in JSS 1, when he saw some of his mates on the streets hustling and making money so he decide to dump school and begin to make money too. “I believe having education is also to (at the end of the day) work for money. So I decided to stop. It is useless,” he said.

The prevailing situation in Zamfara State is also a causative factor for children dropping out of school. One of the victims of banditry in the state is 13 years old Sani Aliyu. He is not currently in school, but it is not by his own making. At the age of 10, he lost his father when bandits raided their village, Yargaladima, in Maru Local Government Area. After the tragedy, he relocated to Gusau where he now sells fruits. Today, according to him, he is doing well but he hopes to go back one day.

Lawali Manu a bread seller at Lalan area of Gusau, Zamfara State, is similarly out of school like Sani, but in his own case, poverty forced him to drop out while still in Primary 4 in his village. For him there is no hope for now of going back.

 

What states are doing

All over the country, it is not uncommon to find pupils learning under trees or a class of 100 pupils having just one teacher. In the North-eastern part of the country for example, the Boko Haram insurgency has deprived many children of access to education because the insurgents had destroyed schools and killed so many teachers

One would have thought that the western part of the country should not be having the issue of out-of-school children, due to its early exposure to western education, but that is not the case. Ironically, Oyo State with its capital, Ibadan has the highest number of out-of-school children in the whole of the western geopolitical zone. The figure stands at almost 300,000.

Sunday Tribune sought to know what states of the federation are doing to end incidence of out-of -school children.

Acting Permanent Secretary, Oyo State Ministry of Education, Mrs Ibironke Fatoki, at a stakeholders’ conference in Ibadan recently said government was serious about getting out-of-school children back to school and to equip them with vocational education.

She continued: “However, despite these efforts made to put a sound education policy practice in place to get these children enrolled, retained, complete basic education and transit to tertiary, it is worrisome to note that the out-of-school children in the state is unduly high.

“It is therefore imperative to sensitise all the stakeholders and enlist their support on the need for concerted efforts to inaugurate aggressive campaign for Leaving No Child Behind and to make every child count.”

Like many states across the country, statistics for the out-of-school children in Ekiti State is not available, though the general belief is that the problem is not prevalent in the state, which tags itself as the Fountain of knowledge.

An official of the Ekiti State Ministry of Education, Science and Technology who would not like to be identified because he is not authorized to speak told Sunday Tribune that the new government in the state was «yet to harmonise its policies and figures and we in the ministry cannot readily come up with a figure.”

The state ministry of education however believes that the announcement of immediate abolition of levies in primary and secondary schools in the state by Governor Kayode Fayemi, on October 17, is a way of further reducing the incident of out of school children in the state.

Hitherto, private nursery/primary schools and secondary schools paid N1,000 per term while public primary and secondary schools paid N500 per term. The levy, which was part of the resolutions at an education summit organised by the state government in 2015, had caused controversy which led the Catholic Diocese of Ekiti to drag the government to court on the legality of the levy.

Sunday Tribune learnt that though the levies were relatively low, many pupils could still not afford it, and this might have increased the number of out of school children in the state. However, with the abolition of all forms of fees, more of the out of school children could be captured and returned to schools.

Nasarawa State government on its own part discovered that the major reason for the preponderance of having out-of-school children in the state is poor financial capability on the part of parents, so it simply introduced free education to enable parents enroll and keep their children in school.

Permanent Secretary, Ministry for Education, Aliyu Abdulahi Agwai told Sunday Tribune that for the past seven and a half years, the state government has toed this path to combat the menace of having children roaming the streets.

He said: “The government since inception has decided to give free education to all students from primary to secondary schools, so that those who are out of school can enrol themselves into without paying anything. You know, the major cause is funds, because lots of parents don›t have that strength to sponsor their children, especially those ones with special need (disabilities). That was why government stepped in to assist them.

“We have so far built three special schools in the three senatorial zones of the state, so that out-of-school children can benefit like other students. The one in Lafia the state capital is already operational, and that of Akwanga and Keffi zones would soon commence.”

Kogi State also has no data on its out-of-school children. State commissioner for education, Mrs Rosemary Oshikoya, said this is one of the major challenges on the problem and so it has no definite figure, a situation she said, has continued for some time because the state has not been receiving intervention funds from international agencies like the World Bank and UNICEF.

Unlike Nasarawa that adduces the problem to poor parents, for Kogi State, natural disasters, poor infrastructure, location of schools and availability of teachers are the major reasons.

Oshikoya explained that some of the local government areas of the state were affected by flood and this had damaged many of the structure in those communities.

According to her, Ibaji and Kogi local government areas particularly had almost all their schools under water during the rainy season leading to massive destruction of the infrastructure.

She, however, added that the state government had embarked on school census and structured information management system to enable it have detailed information on the state of education in the state, review school curriculum and improve the general standard in the sector.

The Chairman of the Niger State Universal Basic Education Board, Alhaji Aljassan Bawa Mohammed in his responses aid the exact number of out of school children in the state is not known, though what is known is, that parents of most of the out-of-school children were from neighbouring states.

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He stated further that the children could be found mostly in Minna, Suleja, Bida, Kontagora and other big towns across state.

The SUBEB boss said the state government is in partnership with the UNICEF to get most of the pupils to enroll in public schools in the state, adding that it was also ready to work with the federal government to eradicate the menace in the state.

Like many states across the country, the Enugu State government is worried about the menace of out-of-school children. Though an Out-of-School Survey was carried out in the state in 2014 in partnership with Education Sector Support Programme in Nigeria (ESSPIN) the problem remained.

To combat it therefore, Governor Ifeanyi Uguwanyi sponsored the Child Right Act Bill in the state and ensured it was passed and signed into law with a view to moving all school-age children off the streets and back to schools.

Not only this government has been soliciting the collaboration of NGOs to reach individual homes, neighbourhoods, streets and council areas in order to enlighten our people to ensure their wards are enrolled in school.

For Zamfara State its own strategy to bring the children back to school is to introduce free feeding programme and it is working. The Public Relations Officer to the Zamfara State Universal Basic Education Board, Mallam Babangida, maintained that this approach has improved school enrolment.

“Cases of out-of-school children have reduced dramatically in the state, and we hope that by the time the security situation improves, our children will all be in school, God willing,” Mallam Babangida stated.

Though it is clear that several states are doing something about the problem, an obvious shortcoming is their inability to know the exact figures of the out-of-school children in their states. The fact is that no matter the efforts being made and unless this problem is first of all taken care of and compulsory free education is enforced,  the country may find its future more endangered when it would have to contend with mostly ill-educated workforce and population.

—Additional reports from Yinka Oladoyinbo, Adelowo Oladipo, Jude Ossai, Sam Nwaoko, Attahiru Ahmed Gusau And Bodunrin Kayode.