A Civil Society Organisation, Connected Development (CODE), has called for the introduction of compulsory 12 years free education for Zamfara State children.
The call is contained in a statement issued by the Chief Executive Officer of the organisation Hamzat Lawal, and made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Monday.
Lawal charged the State Government to guarantee free and quality education for children in the state, following its domestication of the Child Rights Act 2003.
He recalled that Gov. Bello Matawalle on August 17, signed the Child’s Protection Bill into Law in the state.
According to the statement, the Act serves as a comprehensive legal instrument for the protection of the rights of every Zamfara child.
It lauded the governor and State House of Assembly for domesticating the Act.
It argued that the full implementation of the legislation would prevent violations and abuse of the rights of every child in the state.
“It is counterproductive, if children are hindered from developing themselves to become fully-fledged and successful members of society, due to a collapse of the education sector.
“To guarantee the successful future of every child, CODE urges the Zamfara State Government to commit to 12 years of free and compulsory education for every child,” the statement added.
The group urged the governor to be part of its upcoming Education Summit, where the challenges facing the sector and solutions would be extensively discussed.
“The platform is dedicated to assembling critical stakeholders to rub minds on ways to improve school enrollment and retention in northern Nigeria,’’ it said.
It maintained that a key provision of the Act was for every child to have access to quality education.
It noted that the state had recorded a decline in children’s enrollment in schools of late, with insecurity and poverty “worsening the already dire reality”.
The statement added that reports showed that at least 20,000 senior secondary school students did not sit for the 2022 West African Examinations.
It attributed the development to the State Government’s inability to pay examination fees and also clear a backlog of over N1.6bn owed to the examination council.
“This raises concern about the state of education in the state, which is home to over 9.2 million citizens, according to the 2006 census,” it stated.
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