BY KAYODE KOMOLAFE
Many students would not be going back to the classrooms as the new school year begins across the country. This is because they are in captivity.
The condition of the hundreds of kidnapped students should be treated as a matter of national emergency.
In practical terms, the human development of a significant number of members of a generation is being arrested in the climate of insecurity plaguing the country. The implications of this disastrous trend are immense for the present and future. In every sense, the condition of the students in captivity is a major human cost of the crisis in the land.
According to a statement from the United Nations International Children Fund (UNICEF), over 200 students are languishing in kidnapper’s den. This highly dispiriting figure of abductions was given in a last month estimate. Since then more abductions have taken place while the kidnappers have also set free some students after millions of naira were reportedly paid in ransom.
Only two days ago, the picture got grimmer as the same UNICEF and the European Union (EU) said in another statement that more than 300,000 children have been killed in the northeast of Nigeria alone. It is also estimated that over a million children have been displaced in the region. The humanity of these victims of terrorism is being assaulted with impunity. Yet these are children who should, in a normal situation, be in school. It has also been reported that a recent assessment of the Mental Health and Psychosocial Support needs of the children in the zone, which has been the epicentre of the Boko Haram War, indicated various forms of stress.
These include aggressiveness, anger, hyper-vigilance, and anxiety. This regime of stress to which the children are subjected is implicated in the cases of poor brain development, low self-esteem and other forms of mental problems. The statement was made in the context of a 10 million euros – fund provided by the European Union to provide vocational skills and non-formal education for at least 25, 000 young persons. The project is tagged Early Recovery and Resilience Project. It will be implemented by UNICEF.
Now, if nothing more could be done about the children killed, the EU and UNICEF seem to be saying by their action that the displaced and dislocated could still be assisted to recover early and muster some resilience to face the future.
In the same spirit, the abducted students are in dire need of their freedom.
These students have been in captivity for varying periods of time.
It is 2,709 days today that over 100 girls abducted from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno State, have been in captivity. Today is also the 1,302nd that Leah Sharibu, a girl in a secondary school in Dapchi, Yobe State, has been in captivity.
This calendar of distress has been sadly expanding in the last seven years.
Some students of the Federal Government College in Birnin Yauri, Kebbi State, have been held by their adductors for 98 days while the students of Baptist School Kujama in Kaduna State have in kidnapper’s den for 80 days now.
In some recent cases of abductions, the students were released after been held in captivity for weeks. There have stories of poor parents selling their belongings to meet the demands of the kidnapers. Such was the bitter experience of the 136 children, whose ages range between three and eleven, kidnapped at the Saliu Tanko Islamic school in Tegina, in Rafi Local Government Area of Niger State.
Most of the students regained their freedom after almost three months.
These are pupils in nursery and primary schools!
Some of the students died in the process just as some of the parents died of shock. One of their teachers broke down in a live programme on ARISE TV as he recounted the tragic incident. At a point, the kidnappers demanded N150 million from the poor parents.
Similarly, eight abducted students of the Kaduna State public Nuhu Bamalli Polytechnic in Zaria, Kaduna State, were set free two weeks ago by kidnappers after 28 days in captivity. Bandits reportedly invaded the school and kidnapped staff and students.
Some of the kidnapped students of the Unity College students in Kebbi have also been lucky to regain their freedom. Some, however, died in the process. The police and the army actually rescued some of the students in this particular case.
Some heavily armed bandits reportedly invaded the town on motorcycles, from the Rijau forest in the neighbouring Niger State. At a stage, it was believed that over 100 students were being held in the forest by kidnappers in Kebbi State.
Many of the students abducted in both Chibok and Dapchi have also since been released from captivity.
The sad stories of the abductions students have been reviewed on this page on different occasions to draw attention to the often down-played humanitarian cost of the crisis. For instance, after the abduction of over 300 students in Kankara secondary school in Zamfara State, on December 11 last year, the following observation was made on this page:
“Therefore, it is time the Nigerian state was asked: when exactly is it a national embarrassment? When will the national shame be officially acknowledged that six years after the Chibok tragedy the combined efforts of defence and internal security organisations could not ensure the security of students in Kankara Science Secondary School? Whatever happened to the professional acumen and the capacity of the army, police, SSS, civil defence corps and other security outfits supposedly on duty in Katsina State? When indeed is it an emergency?
“All efforts should be made to prevent a catastrophe in the extremely delicate situation of Kankara…
“The manner of the abduction of the students in Kankara is a clear pointer to the limits of rationalisation of the failures of the nation’s security system. The attackers reportedly arrived Kankara after 10 p.m. on more than 150 motorcycles. Imagine a convoy of 150 motorcycles ridden freely across local government areas. And hundreds of boys taken away on those motorcycles! That ought to be conspicuous enough to attract the attention of security men. While a detachment of the invaders went in to take the boys from the school, another group blocked the road to prevent access to the scene of the crime.
“The attack on Kankara proved that the nation has not learnt sufficient lessons from earlier attacks on schools.”
The abductions that happened before Kankara could also be cited to illustrate the point about the strategic failure of the Nigerian state in the situation.
Mercifully, the Kankara schoolboys were released on December 17 last year reportedly with the help of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACABAN).
While the police and other security forces should intensify the efforts to secure the freedom of those students still in captivity, it is important for the state and local governments to support the parents of the kidnapped students who are distress.
The matter was once put like this on this page:
“When last did any government official speak with the parents of Leah Sharibu to offer them some words of hope? Are there regular meetings with the parents of the over 100 Chibok girls in captivity to comfort them and lift their spirit? In the first place, the Nigerian state failed the poor girls by not preventing their abduction… Why can’t the humanitarian dimension of the crisis be approached in a more organic and sensitive manner? The official response should be imbued with empathy.”
In the first six months of this year, almost a thousand students were kidnapped in various parts of the country. As a result, some state governments in the north ordered closures of schools especially the boarding ones. To imagine that this trend continues in a country in which over 10 million children are already out of school! Insecurity has become the greatest obstacle to education especially in the north of Nigeria.
This situation has continued despite the $30 million dollar Safe School Initiative meant to tackle the problem.
It is relevant in the circumstance to revisit the idea of the Safe Schools Initiative. It is a concept sorely waiting for execution.
A bit of reminder might be apposite in this regard. Soon after Chibok happened, the Safe Schools Initiative for Nigeria was launched on May 7, 2014 at the World Economic Forum held in Abuja.
The support for the programme stoutly came from a coalition of Nigerian business leaders working with the United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education, former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. The initiative was to start with a pledge of $10 million to keep about 500 schools safe in the north of Nigeria. The strategy was to build a community of security groups comprising the police, parents, teachers, community and youths.
The funding expected to come from investments from government, business leaders and the Global Business Coalition for Education, A World at School and other corporate bodies.
The federal government (through the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development) and the relevant state and local agencies should synergise on how to execute the programme.
It should be redesigned by experts to make it achieve better results in the light of the worsening condition of the students.
Doubtless, the investments in safe schools are obviously for the future of Nigeria. The present is already troubled. So any collaboration to save the future by keeping students secure to learn in their schools should be supported by the private sector and other non-governmental organisations.
To put an end to the national nightmare of students being in captivity, the security authorities should be more accountable on matters of security while the federal and state governments should make keeping students safe in school a national priority.
It is never a normal thing that hundreds of students are in captivity. The abducted students must not be forgotten. Attention should always be drawn to their suffering. It is the duty of the state to liberate them from captivity. So, the inhuman condition of the students still being held by kidnappers should be taken as a challenge to the Nigerian state and an open sore on the conscience of the society.
QUOTE
“The inhuman condition of the students still being held by kidnappers should be taken as a challenge to the Nigerian state and an open sore on the conscience of the society itself”
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