By Lizzy Carr
Women in the Masori community of Alkaleri Local Government Area of Bauchi state have called on the Bauch State Government to introduce a community-driven empowerment program for women to support their children in obtaining a basic education.
They spoke to Journalists at Alkaleri local government who were there on an assessment visit of out-of-school children facilitated by the Bauchi Field Office of UNICEF.
One of the mothers Fatima Mohammed said that women in the area have no or limited resources to support their children obtain basic literacy.
“Without any trade, we cannot send our children to school as our husbands have neglected their parental roles of the child’s right to education,
If we have something doing then our children especially the girls will not have to hawk but will be in school,”
The village head of Gumchiguni, Ali Darling Shani said dilapidated school classrooms and lack of water and sanitation facilities push their children away from school.
“During the rainy season, the roofs of most classes leak so our children stay at home and help us with farm work,”
To Lami Ibrahim, a mother of six children, the crisis of our school children was due to a lack of educational materials to aid the learning process.
“Women are left with the responsibility of providing educational materials like books, uniforms, school bags and shoes and financing children ‘s education.,as full-time housewives without a source of income, we have no other option than to send them to the streets and schools to hawk to get money for their educational needs,”
Asabe Baba, mother of four lamented that despite several attempts to enroll her children, poverty was instrumental in denying them access to school.
“My husband is a peasant farmer whose harvest can bearly feed us all year round, not to talk of having enough to send our children to school, I have four and my mate has five children,”
The Leader, of Community Education Volunteers in Alkaleri, Talatu Ibrahim said although the husbands allow their children to enroll in basic education, women battle with the provision of academic materials and fees, and books.
“We do house-to-house mobilization on school enrollment but the children are left at the mercy of their mother.
“I will recommend that women should be financially empowered to fully support their children as the mothers are interested in seeing that their children attend school but not on empty stomachs,”
Ibrahim said in one of their visits they witnessed an incident at a primary school in Masori, where two children they mobilized to the school came out and started vomiting.
“We thought it was fever or malaria but only to realize after feeding them that it was hunger,”
She acknowledged that community mobilization has improved societal orientation and attitude towards basic education.
In his contribution, a class teacher at Masori primary school attributed the community occupation as a leading cause of out-of-school.
“We witness low turn out of school children in first and third terms because their parents are Farmers.
“So they converge with children during school hours on their farms, that alone has posed a challenge in schools attendance,”
During the visit, our correspondent noticed that while classes were ongoing in schools, children of school age were on the streets hawking bambara nuts, groundnut, and onions.
They rush at each passing vehicle on the busy Bauchi-Gombe highway with the hope of getting a buyer.
These girls are doing this to help their families put food on the table and settle other domestic needs.
Fatima Musa and Hauwa Abdullahi express concern about not being in school.
The duo said that for the past four years, they have not been to school as their parents cannot afford the basic requirements like books, uniforms, and PTA fees.
Hussein Mohammed is 16 years old and roams the streets instead of attending school.
The orphan who lives with his stepmother at Bayan Banki is just one of the millions of out-of-school children in Nigeria.
Bauchi State is said to have over one million children who are not in school like Hussein, Fatima, and Hauwa.
Speaking on this development, the Director of Schools Services, Bauchi State Universal Education Board Koriji Buba Umar said there are improvements in school enrollment as contained in the 2023 Annual schools census.
“1,269,228 pupils were enrolled into primary school and 5,000 into junior secondary school in 2023,”
With these figures, it shows that the rate of retention and transition from one level of education to the other is still a challenge in Bauchi State.
