Terror on education: Untold story of out-of-school children in North Central

Violence between farmers and herders, intra-ethnic or communal misunderstanding and attacks by bandits, militants and other criminals in local communities in North Central states of Nigeria have destroyed schools’ infrastructure and forced many children out of school after displacing their parents. Together with their parents, thousands of children are now taking refuge in school buildings […]

Violence between farmers and herders, intra-ethnic or communal misunderstanding and attacks by bandits, militants and other criminals in local communities in North Central states of Nigeria have destroyed schools’ infrastructure and forced many children out of school after displacing their parents.

Together with their parents, thousands of children are now taking refuge in school buildings but they do not access education, no thanks to the protracted crises among many groups over scarce resources including farmlands, grazing areas, disputed boundaries and in some cases greed.

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In Benue, while farmers and herders have continued to attack one another at the slightest provocation, miscreants have unsettled also many communities.

In Nasarawa, it is a tale of converting schools for worship purposes in a certain community and in Niger, parents rather keep their children at home for fear of abduction by bandits.

Most affected by these acts of terrorism are children of the poor in primary and secondary schools whose future looks bleak as they are denied education, quality health and other basic privileges of life.

A visit to some communities by our reporter revealed that relevant authorities appear helpless as the basic foundation of societal growth suffers.

 

‘I was forced out of school after the killing of my parents’

The introduction of the anti-grazing law by Governor Samuel Ortom in 2017 in Benue State to purportedly stem the farmer/herder crisis remains contentious.

While farmers who are mostly indigenes of the state see the development as a respite, herders who are mostly itinerant Fulani believe the law is targeted at them and the result of mutual suspicion is telling on children from both sides.

Thirteen-year-old Patience Terwase had the dream of becoming a doctor or a nurse but that dream is becoming a mirage each passing day.

For the past four years, she has not attended school. When suspected armed herders invaded her village, Tse-Aji, Mbakyoondu, in Gwer-West Local Government Area of Benue State, they did not only kill her parents, they destroyed her school.

She fled the bloody onslaught and now lives with her paternal grandmother in an Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camp in Naka, the headquarters of the local government.

Ironically, she takes shelter in UBE Junior Secondary School, Naka, but she does not attend class.

She stopped schooling in 2017 when she was in primary three and now, she is not just traumatised by the death of her parents, she is frustrated that her dream of being one of the few women who are educated in her hitherto pristine village, has been dashed.

 

“I feel bad and depressed because I wanted to go to school so that I can become a doctor or a nurse but that dream has been cut short,” she said.

Patience is just one out of the over 260, 000 children who have left school due to unabated violence in villages in Guma, Gwer-West, Makurdi, Logo, Katsina-Ala, Agatu, Ukum, parts of Kwande and Buruku local governments of Benue State.

School enrolment has dropped significantly due to assaults by attackers as teachers and students fled for their lives, abandoning the structures as the violence persists in their communities.

There are approximately 13 million out-of-school children in Nigeria but with the unrelenting violence in communities across the country and its impact on education, the figures might be higher.

The UNICEF says one in every five of the world’s out-of-school children is in Nigeria.

Although the Sustainable Development Goals prioritises access to early childhood education, care, and pre-primary education as an integral part of children’s education, many in Nigeria do not have access to education, especially in areas ravished by violent extremism and conflicts.

At least 66 primary and junior secondary schools out of the 140 in Gwer-West Local Government Area have been either destroyed or abandoned and left to rot in rural communities, leaving 12, 507 children out of school.

Patience’s grandmother, 62-year-old Celina Deraor, despairs about her grand-daughter’s predicament but she is hamstrung by her destitute condition.

“I am downhearted about Patience not going to school but we are very poor now. For over four years, we have lived in the camp here.

“We are poor, we have no source of livelihood and we live on handouts. Our farms were our source of livelihood but herders chased us away, killed our loved ones and have occupied our lands, we cannot go back to the farm,” she alleged.

NKST Primary School Ajigba, near Agagbe, Gwer-West Local Government Area is one of the schools abandoned since 2016 due to the unrelenting violence in the community.

The roof has blown off while the ceiling has caved in just as the premises is overgrown by bushes and littered with broken desks and chairs.

This was where Member Kavga, 10, started schooling when she was four, six years ago.

Then, she didn’t have to trek a long distance to school because it is right in her village. But now, she treks two hours to Agagbe, an approximately five-kilometre distance, from Ajigba, to attend a private primary school.

She says she gets hungry and tired and it’s frustrating going through such pains to acquire education.

“If I had continued schooling in Ajigba here, I would have been in primary five now but I am still in primary three and I wonder when I will finish school,” she said. 

 

Enrolment figures dip

Comrade Joseph Utse, the executive chairman of Benue State Universal Basic Education Board has also lamented that the destruction done to primary schools in the state has affected school enrolment significantly.

 Utse said before the crises, the state had over 900,000 enrolment but now has less than 700,000.

“Most of our schools have been burnt down, the furniture has been burnt also, as well as houses near them.

“Schools in Guma, Gwer-West, Makurdi, Logo, Katsina-Ala, Agatu parts of Buruku and Kwande have been deserted.

“Enrolment has dropped; a lot of schools and communities have been deserted.

“Most of them are running for their dear lives so schooling doesn’t seem to be a priority. Enrolment has dropped drastically,” he added.

He, however, said some schools have been opened in IDP camps so that they will properly take care of the children who are out of school.

“Recently, the state government released chairs and desks to be given to the children. And we have employed some teachers on a temporary basis and they are teaching in the emergency schools,” he said. 

 

 ‘Ghana’ militants wreaked havoc

Findings revealed that at least seven schools had been destroyed in Katsina-Ala Local Government Area of Benue State by militants loyal to the late Terwase Akwaza aka Ghana, a notorious bandit who was neutralised by security operatives at the height of his onslaught on communities.

The militants, who terrorized residents of Sankera area of the state since 2013, killed many, razed down homes and destroyed schools.

The schools destroyed are NKST Primary School Gawa; NKST Secondary School Gawa; Government Secondary School Abaji; Yaov Memorial Secondary School Abaji; LGEA Primary School Kpurkpur; RCM Primary School, Ako as well as NKST Primary School Abaji.

Many school children in the area were displaced as school infrastructure was  destroyed while in places where schools were not destroyed, they were unsafe for children and teachers. 

 

No evidence schools were destroyed by herders – MACBAN

Amid allegations that most of the attacks on Benue schools were carried out by herders, the Secretary Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN) in the state, Alhaji Ibrahim Galma, who spoke to Daily Trust Saturday on phone, said there was no evidence that the schools were destroyed by herders.

He said herders have been evacuated from Zones A and B of the state and are now taking refuge in neighbouring states like Nasarawa and Taraba.

“There is no fact about the allegation that the schools were destroyed by herders. When you visit the security agencies, you won’t find any herder arrested for destroying a school.

“In reality, there was serious violence for a couple of years and the herders too were affected more than the indigenous farmers.”

He alleged that while the herders affected by the crises were left without support, when farmers run to the local government headquarters, they get help from the state and federal governments.

“So, you can only prove your allegation when you have evidence.

“It is just an assumption and propaganda. I will not deny that school facilities were destroyed but who destroyed the property is unknown,” he said. 

 

We need N6bn to rebuild schools – Gov Ortom

Speaking on the development, Governor Samuel Ortom said the magnitude of the damage done to schools’ infrastructure was astonishing.

He said an assessment carried out indicated that the state would need N6 billion to rebuild the vandalized and abandoned infrastructure.

“In 2018, I directed the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) to do analysis and give me a report of the level of destruction in these areas and for our primary schools alone, we had a bill of over N6bn that was required to put back the infrastructure in these schools for our children.

“But the challenge has always been that these children cannot go back to their ancestral homes, they cannot go back to these schools.

“That was in 2018 and as of today, because of  more attacks, we have not been able to carry out another analysis but I have directed SUBEB to do another assessment,” he said. 

 

Nasarawa: Returning villagers convert burnt school to church

What was left of LEA Primary School Akpem, Keana Local Government Area of Nasarawa State after it was burnt down in 2018 by marauding herders has now been rebuilt into a church.

It is one of the 26 schools in the LGA deserted due to the destruction of infrastructure by criminals or abandonment by the villagers as violence intensified in their local communities.

Broken desks are dumped around the church where the recently returned villagers worship, indicating that the hundreds of children who have also returned after years of taking refuge in Kadarko and other places, will not be going back to class anytime soon.

In one household alone, 17 children of school age were seen playing around but with no hope of a bright future if they do not get their school back.

Head of the household, Mr Edward Orjime, fears for the future of their children in the community. He said if a new school is not built for them, most of their children will not be educated.

“The few that go are the older ones because the distance to the nearest safe school is six kilometres,” he said.

His son, Paul Orjime, 11, says he would love to have his school back as it was tiring trekking to Kadarko to attend school.

At Agbala, another community that has also received the full blow of the violence, there’s no hope of any child going to any school for the interim.

The far-flung community’s school and its wooden bridge were burnt down by the assailants when they attacked in 2018.

Apart from no child coping with the long trek to Kadarko, the safest and nearest town where a school could be found, the children could not possibly cross the Agbala stream during the rainy season.

However, a villager, Mathew Unongul, said the community members have met and agreed that in 2022, the children will be mobilised back to the ruins of their burnt school where thatched huts will be set up as temporary shelter from sun and rain pending when government restores lasting peace and rebuilds vandalized schools. 

Also, Dr Ibrahim A. Eshi, Director Academic Services, Nasarawa State Universal Basic Education Board, admitted that school enrolment has dropped.

He did not give figures but said the impact of the crisis between herders and farmers on the facilities of public primary schools was adverse.

“Some of the schools were vandalised and as they (children) fled, most of them did not find themselves in places where there are no public primary schools,” he explained in an interview with Daily Trust.

He said those that have taken refuge in the central primary schools across the southern local governments of the state, are automatically enrolled in the schools where they are taking refuge.

But findings by Daily Trust Saturday revealed that at Kadarko North Primary School, where lots of school-age children are taking refuge, enrolment has dropped. According to a source in the school who pleaded anonymity for fear of being victimised, the school used to have 1070 pupils before the violence intensified but now has just about 700.

Also, though the state official claimed only Keana and Awe LGAs were affected by the crisis, findings show Doma and Obi too had schools that were burnt and abandoned. 

Eshi, however, said Governor AA Sule was serious about security, noting that some of the affected schools have resumed because security has improved in the area.

“We are intensifying efforts to ensure that all children return to school. We are gathering data that incorporates all the out-of-school children and the structures that were destroyed as a result of the farmers-herders crisis,” he said.

Dr. Eshi also called on development partners to come in and assist the state in getting the children back to school.

The Director Quality Assurance of SUBEB Nasarawa State, Hajia Khadijat Suleiman, also said the crisis has affected teaching and learning negatively.

“Fifty to 60 per cent of schools in Keana are affected. Rural schools are mostly affected. Few are vandalised while the others are abandoned. We are working towards reconstructing the vandalised ones,” she said. 

 

Niger: Parents fear for children’s safety

The worsening insecurity in Niger State, occasioned by banditry attacks on communities and kidnapping of school children has equally thrown thousands of children out of school.

Daily Trust learnt that the growing incidents of banditry and kidnapping of students is giving parents sleepless nights.

A resident of Minna, Alhaji Mudasiru Shuaibu, who spoke with our reporter said: “It’s disturbing enough when you send a child to school but they’re sent back home because of worsening insecurity.

“It’s unfortunate the situation children’s education has found itself in this country now. It’s a cause of concern.”

Asked how he sees the future of education in the country, he said: “The future will be doomed because children are the leaders of tomorrow.

“If it is happening to the younger generation now, it’ll come to a point where our system will collapse because of decay in education.

“The only difference between human beings and animals is education and if it’s lost, then everything is lost.”

Shuaibu, therefore, urged the government to improve security so that children can go back to school.

Also, another parent who did not give her name, said she worries whenever her children are in school.

“I am not happy because of the banditry and kidnapping in the country because I don’t know what will happen next.

“Government should secure schools and ensure the children are safe. She urged parents to take responsibility and report suspicious people and suspicious movements,” she said.

Niger State also grapples with a growing number of IDPs currently put at 1,464 as a result of sustained bandits onslaught that has sacked many communities.

And findings revealed that approximately 20,000 boarding secondary students have been displaced by the state government’s measure of shutting down 20 vulnerable schools across the state.

When our reporter visited Government Science Secondary School Izom, it was shut down by the state government as a proactive measure to safeguard the lives of students and it was deserted.

Over 200 students have been kidnapped in Kagara and Tegina schools in Niger State in the past one year by bandits as a means of generating money through ransom payments.

With over 13 million out-of-school children roaming the streets and being denied the right to education, there are concerns that the insecurity being experienced now is just the tip of the iceberg compared to what may happen in the future if education for all is not ensured.

This story was produced with the support of Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD)