Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, has challenged the Federal Government to explain how the ₦144.86bn allocated under the National Plan on Financing Safe Schools has been deployed, following reports that insecurity has forced schools to shut down across about 40 local government areas.
Atiku said the continued disruption of education by terrorists, bandits and other armed groups exposed what he described as a failure of the government’s approach to securing schools, particularly amid Nigeria’s already severe out-of-school crisis.
In a statement issued on Tuesday by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, Atiku said the effectiveness of the Safe Schools programme should be judged by whether children and teachers can actually attend school without fear of attack.
“At a time when Nigeria is already battling a severe out-of-school crisis, insecurity is driving even more children from the classroom.
“If schools across about 40 local government areas cannot operate because government cannot guarantee the safety of pupils and teachers, Nigerians are entitled to ask a simple question: where is the ₦144.86bn Safe Schools programme in all of this?” the statement partly read.
The African Democratic Congress presidential candidate demanded a comprehensive account of the programme, including the amount so far mobilised and released, the agencies and contractors that received the funds, the schools covered, security infrastructure delivered and the measurable results achieved.
He, however, argued that financial accountability alone would not address the underlying security challenge.
“Budgeting money is not the same thing as securing schools. Announcing programmes is not the same thing as protecting children. The true measure of a Safe Schools programme is whether our children can actually go to school safely. By that elementary test, the present approach is failing,” he said.
The Safe Schools programme was introduced as part of the Federal Government’s response to the persistent attacks on educational institutions, particularly in conflict-affected parts of the country.
The issue has acquired greater urgency following a series of abductions and attacks on schools in northern Nigeria, which have repeatedly disrupted academic activities and forced parents to weigh education against the safety of their children.
Atiku said the government needed to move away from what he described as a centralised, Abuja-driven approach to school protection and instead build a security system that draws intelligence from communities where vulnerable schools are located.
“What Nigeria requires is a completely different security philosophy. Under my administration, school security will not be treated as another Abuja contract-awarding programme. It will be integrated into a decentralised, intelligence-led security architecture built around the communities where these schools actually exist,” he added.
He proposed functional early-warning and rapid-response systems around vulnerable schools, improved intelligence sharing among schools, local communities and security agencies, and clearly defined security and emergency-response arrangements for institutions considered to be at high risk.
According to him, residents often possess information about unusual movements and emerging threats before such intelligence reaches federal security agencies.
“Local communities know their terrain. They know when unfamiliar people enter their communities and often see the warning signs before Abuja does. Our security architecture will make that local intelligence part of the national response rather than leaving communities helpless until an attack has already occurred,” the statement further read.
The ADC candidate also called for a system in which every naira spent on school security could be traced to a specific outcome.
PUNCH
