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Two million children robbed of education in west, central Africa, says UNICEF

By Iyabo Lawal
10 October 2019   |   2:53 am
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned that deliberate attacks on teachers, students and schools are threatening education in west and central Africa.The agency in a report titled, ‘Child alert’ expressed concern that the right to education is being violated.....

UNICEF

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned that deliberate attacks on teachers, students and schools are threatening education in west and central Africa.The agency in a report titled, ‘Child alert’ expressed concern that the right to education is being violated in communities hit by conflict” in the region.

The agency cited Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Cameroun, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mali and Niger in the report.It said, “Right now, nearly two million children are being robbed of education in the region due to violence and insecurity in and around their schools. A surge in threats and attacks against students, teachers and schools in Nigeria and others in the region is casting a foreboding shadow upon children, their families, communities and society at large.

“Many areas in west and central Africa are witnessing increased hostility towards education by warring factions. More than one quarter of the 742 verified attacks on schools globally in 2018 took place in five countries across West and Central Africa.”UNICEF noted that the number of schools compelled to close down due to rising insecurity in conflict-affected areas of the region tripled between the end of 2017 and June 2019.
Specifically, it stated that 9,272 schools closed across eight countries in the region as of June, affecting no fewer than 1.91 million children and nearly 44,000 teachers.

“Particularly in the countries of the Central Sahel (Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger) and the Lake Chad Basin (Cameroun, Chad, Niger and Nigeria), ideological opposition to what is seen as Western-style education, especially for girls, – is central to many of these disputes.

“As a result, school children, teachers, administrators and the education infrastructure are being deliberately targeted. At the same time, worsening insecurity and conflict, including the use of schools by armed forces and groups, further disrupts a child’s access to and quality of education.

“When education is under attack, safe schooling in the traditional sense becomes impossible to provide. The threat of attacks creates a sense of fear in local communities, forcing schools to close, teachers to flee and school children to remain at home, unable to learn in classrooms with their peers,” UNICEF said.

The agency further noted that out-of-school children were also not spared of dangers.“Compared to their peers who are in school, they are at a much higher risk of recruitment by armed groups.“Girls face an elevated risk of gender-based violence and are forced into child marriage more often, with ensuing early pregnancies and childbirth that threaten their lives and health,” it added.

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