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From Sola Ojo, Kaduna
Chairman Farmers-Herders Initiative for Peace and Development Africa, Salim Musa Umar, on Friday said insecurity in the country has claimed the lives of 2,000 farmers and displaced 19,000 others in the past seven years.
Umar spoke as a resource person at a one-day training workshop on Data Collectors on the Impact of Conflict and Insecurity in the Implementation of Nomadic Education Programmes on Nomadic Communities in Selected North-Central States of Niger, Nasarawa and Plateau, organised by National Commission for Nomadic Education.
Speaking to the paper titled; “Rural Banditry and its Implication for Effective Service Delivery on National Commission for Nomadic Education”, added that over 1,500 schools have been destroyed within the years under review.
“The issue of armed banditry and kidnapping has resulted in the loss of human lives and cattle, inability to graze or cultivate farmlands by nomads and host communities alike.
“The rampant growth of extortionate banditry has added new dimensions to Nigeria’s educational sector as over 1,500 schools destroyed since 2014. It has resulted in an increase of out-of-school children and a drop in new enrollments across the board in formal and non-formal sectors of our school system”, he said.
Earlier, the Executive Secretary of the National Commission for Nomadic Education, Prof. Bashir Usman lamented the spate of insecurity across Nigeria such as kidnapping, armed banditry and cattle rustling have had debilitating effects on nomadic education, has said.
Represented by the Director, Quality Assurance in the Commission, Mr. Akin Akinyosoye, the varsity don lamented that insecurities including violent communal clashes, sea piracy among others have led to the loss of many lives and the destruction of school facilities, which has impacted the smooth running of the nomadic education programme.
According to him, the nomadic education programme was to provide relevant quality and functional basic education to the nomadic population, whose lifestyle won’t allow them to enjoy conventional education.
He added that the training workshop aimed at developing the capacity of data collectors to generate evidence-based data on the root causes of the conflict and insecurity, developing trainees’ capacity on the use of Kobo collect software application for data collection and build the capacity of participants’ technical support to communities in addressing emerging issues due to conflict and insecurity.
“The resultant effect of insecurity on the programme includes among others loss of lives and destruction of school facilities. This, therefore has worsened the rate of high teacher attrition, poor pupil enrolment, daily attendance, retention, completion and transition.
“The high level of insecurity leads to displacement of nomads that resulted in complete abandonment of schools and frequent migration which increases the high rate of dropouts as well as out-of-school children.
“To address the challenges, there is the need for the Commission to assess the impact of conflict on the Implementation of Nomadic Education Programmes, hence the conduct of the training workshop for data collectors.
“It is expected that at the end of the exercise reliable and valid data would be generated through the interaction with local communities and other critical stakeholders on the remote and immediate causes of the conflict and insecurity”, he said.
