The Senate, on Wednesday, called for the establishment of mobile courts for the trial and imprisonment of parents and guardians refusing to enrol their wards in school in compliance with the Universal Basic Education Act.
The move is to address the 20 million out-of-school children in the country.
The Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, specifically urged the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory to adopt the measures he used in Akwa Ibom State when he was governor, which entailed six months imprisonment for parents and guardians of school-aged children found on the streets or in the farm, during school hours.
The Senate made the resolution, following a motion by Senator Idiat Adebule, (APC, Lagos West), titled: “Compelling need to tackle the challenge of out-of-school children in Nigeria.”
Adebule, in the motion, said it had become worrisome, going by the 2022 report of the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, UNESCO that about 20 million Nigerian children are out of school, which represents 10 per cent of the estimated Nigerian population of 200 million people and also represents the highest number of out-of-school children from any country globally.
She said, “Though the Federal Ministry of Education has disputed the figure, it’s generally agreed that whatever the real figures, the issue of out-of-school children has become an albatross on the neck of the Nigerian state that must be dealt with as a matter of urgency.”
In his contribution to the motion, Senator Adams Oshiomhole (APC Edo North), said the menace must be tackled very urgently because illiteracy engenders poverty and poverty engenders crime.
“I really don’t think we need any tutorial to remind us that he or she who didn’t have the opportunity or was denied the opportunity to go to school is destined to be poor forever.
“An illiterate young man or woman is bound to give birth to another illiterate child which will lead to a dynasty of the poor constituting a risk to the rich and the society at large.
“Today in Nigeria, we can see and we are all witnesses that inequality and abject poverty anywhere has constituted a huge security risk to everyone in Nigeria. It is clear that every Nigerian child needs to go to school,” Oshiomhole said.
He accused some governors, particularly from the northern part of the country, of sabotaging efforts of the Federal Government to make basic education free and compulsory for every child in Nigeria.
“The governors sabotaging the policy, deliberately refusing to contribute 50 per cent of fund required from them as counterpart funding of UBE policy,” he said.
Supporting the motion, the Deputy Senate President, Jibrin Barau, said the problem needed to be frontally addressed because it was the out-of-school children that later became tools for terrorism, banditry, kidnapping and other violent crimes in the country.
Barau said, “I commend Senator Adebule Idiat for moving this motion. Bringing it forward at this point is a big service to our nation. Education is said to be the bedrock of every society; it’s a pillar upon which every human being begins his or her life.”
Other senators, like the former Senate President, Ahmad Lawan (APC Yobe North), Mohammed Monguno (APC Borno North), contributed to the debate by calling on government at all levels to urgently arrest the trend.
In his remarks after the adoption of prayers in the motion as resolutions, Akpabio said, “Since education is the bedrock of all good things in any society, government at all levels, should ensure that no school-age child stays out of school in Nigeria.
“We did it in Akwa Ibom State when I was governor by enforcing compliance to the UBE Act by all Parents or Guardians or were made to know that anybody caught not sending his or her child to school, risks six months imprisonment.
“By way of legislation, the Child Rights Act was put in place which has free and compulsory education as parts of its provisions. Other states in Nigeria should adopt this as required measures of making education truly free and compulsory for children in the country,” he added.