Ahmed Audi, the Commandant General of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps on Thursday launched a special squad, the Safe School Response Team to protect schools from all forms of attacks in the North Central region of the country.
This follows the urgent necessity to bolster security measures at all of the area’s educational institutions, including schools and colleges.
The team, which consists of members of the Department of State Security Services, the Nigerian Army, and the Nigerian Police Force, among others, is anticipated to put an end to the recent wave of attacks on educators, students, and school personnel in the six states that make up the North Central region as well as the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
Speaking at a one-day sensitization workshop for strategic stakeholders in the North Central geopolitical zone on the activities of the National Safe Schools Response Coordination Center and Safe School Project in Nigeria, Audi stated that the federal government had assigned the Corps to oversee project coordination. The workshop was held in Lafia, the capital of Nasarawa State.
In addition to urging stakeholders to support the Safe Schools implementation project so that the security agencies may meet their goals, the CG expressed confidence that the initiative’s seamless execution would lessen the burden of out-of-school children in the area.
“The National Safe Schools Response Coordination Centre is a product of the National Plan on Safe Schools in Nigeria. The menace of violence and attacks on schools in Nigeria is not a new phenomenon to us. For more than a decade, Nigeria has experienced deliberate targeting of education and destruction of facilities; disrupting schools and keeping children out of school.
“The risk of keeping children out of schools continuously and the consequences thereof can only be imagined. It is in an attempt to address this ugly situation that the Centre was created by the government and domiciled under the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps with the responsibility of coordinating safety and security responses against violence in schools and host communities.
“So far, about 48 cases of planned attacks on schools have been thwarted through the collaborative efforts of the Centre. This workshop is one in the series of several advocacies, awareness creation and sensitization programmes being carried out by the Centre to galvanize support, synergy and collaborations towards tackling the challenge of school attacks and violence which has kept a lot of our children out of schools over a long period,” the NSCDC Commandant General added.
On his part, Brigadier General MBG Martins said in a keynote that the issue of kidnapping and banditry in schools across the nation will soon be a thing of the past while commending the federal government for initiating the National Safe Schools Response Coordination Centre.
“The prevalent state of attacks around the world and schools in particular has been on the rise in recent years. This activity being undertaken by the NSCDC is in response to having safe, secure and violent-free schools. The proactive step taken by the Corps to organise this programme will remain a noble and outstanding one,” he said.
In support of him, Abbas Bappa-Muhammed, the Nasarawa State Commandant of the NSCDC, said that every member of the command is dedicated to making sure that schools in the state’s thirteen Local Government Areas are protected.
In order to facilitate the project’s successful launch in the state, Tersoo Shaapera, the Commander of the NSSRCC, and his team received a building structure earlier from Nasarawa State Governor Abdullahi Sule. Emmanuel Akabe, Governor Sule’s deputy, was present for the event.
