Not all the children you see on the streets of Nigeria hawking petty products are happy being out of school. Financial issues, internal crisis, disability, gender inequality, and leadership problems are some of the factors why some of them are not enrolled in any formal education system or dropped out.
Out-of-school, what does it really mean?
When children within the school-age-bracket are not school or they are not enrolled because of circumstances beyond their control, they are said to be out-of-school-children.
The government of Nigeria recognizes the fact that it has a very serious issue at hand when it acknowledged that it has 10.5 million children, who are out of school, saying it is the highest in the world.
Because of the issue of data, the government may not even be correct with that figure. It is more that as another data from UNICEF put the number of children out of school in 2023 at 17.81 million.
Factors responsible for out-of-school children
You may be wondering how a country blessed with numerous natural resources and earns billions of dollars from oil revenue could be battling with such a baffling number of school children, who should be in class, but they are not.
Here are the key factors responsible for this anomaly in the education system in the most populous African country:
Corruption
Corruption is one of the problems facing the development of education in Nigeria and has really impacted the number of out of school children. For instance, The Economists in its 2019 report said Nigeria has lost an estimated $582 billion to corruption which is perpetrated by the political class since the country gained independence in 1960. They stash most of the stolen funds in the west.
If we focus our attention to the education sector, for instance, funds that were allocated to the development of education at state levels by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) were either embezzled by state governors or being unaccounted for.
UBEC is Nigeria’s federal agency that is responsible for implementing and coordinating all activities regarding education-for-all, to ensure that everyone has basic education regardless of ethnicity, religion, location, and gender among others.
However, some state governors dip their hands into UBEC funds. For instance, N1.5 billion fund under the leadership of Bukola Saraki was allegedly mismanaged in 2013 when he was the governor. He denied any wrongdoing and threatened to sue one of his successors, Alhaji Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, who made the allegation.
Till date, some government primary and secondary schools in Kwara are still in bad shape. Dilapidated school buildings can be found in almost the 36 states across Nigeria because of their brazenness of the political class.
Insufficient funding of education
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) recommended at least 26% of budgetary allocation for education, which the government allocates to the education ministry.
Even when funds are allocated for the infrastructural development of schools, they are not enough. In most cases, education commissioners concentrate on schools in the state capital.
Most of the schools in the local and remote areas are in poor condition. They are abandoned. Some of them collapsed because of poor funding. In most cases, school children who are determined for basic education learn under trees and local tents made of palm trees.
Because of the poor infrastructure, some parents prefer to take their kids to farms, where they think they would be more useful to them.
High rate of poverty
The incidence of multidimensional poverty is found across most states. At least 63% of Nigerians are multidimensionally poor, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) in its November 2022 report.
The NBS stats also revealed that 72% of rural dwellers are in multidimensional poverty, compared to 42% in the urban areas.
How can children of parents who are multidimensionally poor afford to buy exercise books and writing materials for their kids? Most of these children found themselves helping their parents doing menial jobs or roam the streets when their children are out to hustle for the family.
Problem of insecurity
The number of out of school children in Nigeria has always been disturbing, but the insurgency (Boko Haram), banditry, and other forms of insecurity in the Northern part of the country have compounded the problem.
And data doesn’t lie. The number of children out of school in the North West geopolitical zone alone is more than the combined number of out of school kids in the Southwest, South South, and southeast geopolitical zones. Over eight million children in the Northwest are not enrolled or dropped out of school because of multifaceted problems.
The Northeast, where Boko Haram insurgency originated from has over 2.4 million displaced people, including children, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), an agency of the United Nations in Nigeria says in its April 2016 report.
Even when improvised classes are provided in their makeshift IDP camps, they are occasional targets of the insurgents. These have discouraged many of the school children. It has thrown millions of them out of classrooms.
Since the first set of school girls aged from 14 to 18 were kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists in Chibok, Borno State, on April 14, 2014, more than 15 incidences of school abductions had occurred, Kaduna State accounting for the highest number of school abduction incidences. This has dealt a huge blow on the psyche of the students and has even forced some parents to withdraw their kids from schools.
Poor implementation of the Child Rights law
The Child Rights law, among other things, emphasizes the need for every child to attend and complete primary and junior secondary school education and the roles of every parent and guardian to make sure this is implemented.
While some states in Nigeria are trying to implement the Child Rights Act 2003, some states such as Bauchi, gombe, Adamawa, Kano and Zamfara are lagging behind.
Even in some states where the Child Right Act has been domesticated, it is poorly implemented. A lot of children are still out of school instead of being in class.
Uncontrolled fertility
Uncontrolled birth rate is another factor that is contributing to the problem of out of school children in Nigeria. Between 1960 to 1990, Nigeria’s population grew from 44,928,342 to 97,685,360; between 1991 to 2021, it has grown to 213,401,323, and according to the UNFPA estimate, Nigeria’s population is expected to reach at least 400 million by 2050.
Some parents give birth to children who don’t have the financial strength to take care of them. In some parts of the country, some parents push their kids into the street to fend for themselves, this is an issue.
Religious beliefs
Religious beliefs have also affected some of the parents, believing that the care of a child is in the hands of God, hence, they believe that God has got their back while they continue to reproduce.
A man who marries four to six wives with more than 20 children, when he obviously knows that his earnings can not be enough to even take proper care of two, many of the children would be out-of-school or they turn to societal problems, causing mayhems in the community during elections.
Gender inequality
The belief that girls will end up in their man’s bedroom and kitchen regardless of their level of education has also contributed to the growing rate of out-of-school children.
The practice was rampant in the olden days, but adequate campaign and enlightenment by the local and global non-governmental organizations have helped in reducing the incidences of education gender inequality.
Weaponizing poverty by the political class
Out-of-school children are mostly used for heinous activities such as human bombings by Boko Haram insurgents in the Northern part of Nigeria. At least 38 girls were used as agents of suicide bombing in 2018 while in the previous year, 146 children were used, UNICEF June 2019 report reveals.
Even when these children grow up, they are used as political thugs and cause mayhem during campaigns and elections. The lack of political will to reduce the number of out-of-school children, according to some social analysts, is deliberate by the political class.
How to solve the issue of out of school children:
To reduce the high rate of school children that do are not enrolled or dropped out of school, we will make the following recommendations:
allocation of least 26% yearly budget to education
yanking off the immunity of any state governor that mismanage or embezzle UBEC funds allocated to their state
by bringing on board religious leaders including Islamic clerics as agents of education campaigns because they are very influential and some of their subjects listen more to them than the government.
by sanctioning parents who deprive their child the right to education
the government, including the political class, must also lead by example such as making sure that their children attend public schools
adequate remuneration of school teachers
to reduce the rate of out-of-school children, the government should provide adequate security across all schools in the country by using technology to secure schools
School feeding is one of the ways the government is using to encourage poor parents to put their kids in school. This programme must be properly managed and monitored so that allocated funds for school feeding are not embezzled by some self-centered politicians.
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