THE well-documented plight of Nigerian children in the North-East has been further highlighted by the latest report of the United Nations Children’s Fund. According to the UN agency, over 300,000 children lost their lives in the last 12 years because of the insurgency ravaging the region. Much more startling is the aspect that no fewer than 5,129 out-of-school children are currently battling mental health challenges because of the conflict in the region.
The report said millions of children there are severely malnourished. Worse, their plight is deteriorating unimaginably by the day. “The scars of conflict are real and enduring for children,” a disturbed UNICEF Representative in Nigeria, Peter Hawkins, said. “Too many children in North-East Nigeria are falling victim to a conflict they did not start. Attacks against children must stop immediately.”
Truly, children have been disproportionately affected by the 12-year-long Boko Haram terrorism. Commendably, the UNICEF chief noted that the conflict-affected out-of-school children in Borno State, who cut across six local government areas, were receiving services, including mental health support in safe spaces to strengthen their well-being, resilience, literacy skills and self-reliance. He said that stress and violence had been linked to poor brain development, depression and poor self-esteem, and children exposed to conflict and violence were at risk of long-term mental health and psychosocial issues.
This is a depressing scenario that should be reversed quickly. Sadly, there appears to be no definitive action plan by the Northern state governments to deal with these challenges. This is a violation of Section 16 of the 1999 Constitution, which prescribes that the state should control the national economy for the welfare, freedom and happiness of every Nigerian citizen based on social justice, equality of status and opportunity. With the grossly inadequate investment in health and education by state governments, the governors have failed to use the instrument of governance to improve the welfare of the people, especially children, in tandem with the law.
Earlier in 2020, a World Food Programme study showed that 3.4 million people were facing acute hunger while 300,000 children were suffering from acute malnutrition in the three North-East states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe. This brought to the fore the dire and heartrending conditions of living for children in the region. The study estimated that 8.6 million people in the North-East were food insecure, not sure where the next meal would come from.
All this, however, points to the spectacular failure of leadership at all levels in the North. A recent meeting of the Northern Governors’ Forum in Kaduna, along with notable religious and political leaders, did not find the disconcerting concerns raised by UNICEF worth reflecting on. That is absurd.
Instead, the gathering was more interested in political permutations of where the next President of the country comes from in 2023. Until the Northern leaders collectively rise to the challenge, and work towards the resolution of the lingering conflict in the region, the misery and underdevelopment that have been afflicting the children and the region, as indicated in the gory statistics above, will not abate anytime soon.
The North-East region has been home to over a decade-old intractable conflict and violence occasioned by the Islamist Boko Haram insurgency. The Council on Foreign Relations says the terrorist group has killed about 70,000 persons and displaced an estimated 2.5 million people, including children, within the period.
One sure way of ending the miserable condition of children in the North is for the state governments to focus on improved funding of education and health in the region. Particularly, state governments should initiate policies and programmes to scale up education and health infrastructure. The governors ought to be embarrassed that over 68 percent of the over 10 million out-of-school children in the country come from the North. Co-founder of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, had advised that “investments in primary healthcare, education and efficient deployment of resources will end inequalities in Nigeria.” Sadly, this is one admonition not heeded by the northern governors, resulting in the millions of out-of-school children and high infant and maternal mortality rates in the region. They would rather focus on manipulating religion and political manoeuvring.
There are lessons to learn from their colleagues from the South like Ebonyi and Akwa Ibom states that initiated and implemented policies that boosted school enrolment after years of lagging behind other southern states. There is a need for them to demonstrate how to run a modern government that emphasises human capital development. The essence of leadership is to design strategies to solve existential challenges and demonstrate the sincerity of purpose in the pursuit of such objectives. This is not rocket science.
Instead of prioritising sponsorship of mass marriages and pilgrimages, building mosques and palaces for traditional leaders, emphasis should be placed on human capital development. The leaders should point the way forward for the development and reconstruction of the region, instead of depending on international development actors, donor agencies and partners.
Ultimately, because of the unnerving nexus between conflict and misery, every strategy and effort aimed at bringing an end to the debilitating Boko Haram insurgency and associated banditry in the region should be explored and implemented by the Northern political and religious leaders. So long as the region remains a killing field, the deleterious effect of the war on women and children as well as other vulnerable groups will remain gripping.
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