The wives of the 19 Northern State Governors on Saturday said that the terror bandits inflicting killings, destruction and kidnapping in the region must be defeated for children to feel safe going to school and also engaged in national developmental initiatives.
Chairperson of the Northern State Governors Forum and First Lady of Kaduna State, Hadiza El-Rufai, said in Abuja that they are also determined to collaborate with the federal government to combat gender-based violence and drugs abuse.
According to her, closure of schools is a short-term plan to tackle the kidnapping of school children, but that the security agencies must do all it can to defeat the bandits for all children to return to schools on the long run.
Hadiza who rolled out the activities of the forum in 2021 and 2022, said banditry is one of the issues security agencies must tackle to enable them achieved their objectives.
“We are concern about kidnapping of school children. The short-term plan is about closing down the schools as Kaduna and Zamfara state are doing.
“You don’t put the children in danger by taking them to school. The bandits must be defeated at all cost.
“We cannot continue like this. We must defeat the bandits for children to go to school. The short term, you must shut down the schools,” she said.
Also, the Vice Chairperson of the forum, who is also the first lady of Kwara State, Ambassador Olufolake Abdulrazak, said they will ensure the sustainability of the programme even beyond 2023.
According to her, the programmes would be such that their successors would see their merits and ensure their sustainability.
On her part, the Special Assistant to the President on Social Investment in the Office of the Vice President, Mariam Uwais, who earlier briefed the Governor’s wives on what the federal government is doing on empowerment of women, young girls and school children, said they will get the data of out of school children and address their health concerns.
“The States has the constitutional mandate to bring the children to share a framework for digital skills, agriculture and other empowerment programme.
“We are collaborating with the Governor’s wives and other stakeholders to select 50 young educated but not employed youths in every Local Government, empower them to mentor the young children and guide those that are out of school to return to the school and remain in schools.
“Fifty will be selected in every Local Government. They will be paid N30,000 which is the minimum wage. This will create capacity and create jobs for them,” Uwais said.
