SPECIAL REPORT: In Niger State, schooling for pupils halted as terror victims take over classes
Pupils’ access to learning is undermined as people forcibly displaced by Boko Haram Terrorists in Niger State have converted classrooms into IDP camps.
On 20 July 2022, hundreds of terror victims loitered around the Kuta displacement camp in Niger State. Dozens of men climbed the decaying fences of the place; others sat discussing under baobab trees, watching this visiting reporter. Women, many of whom were nursing mothers, clustered behind the walls and in the rooms of the camp.
As you moved around this place, the personal effects of the people welcomed your gaze. Wooden mortars and their pestles; aluminium pots and plates; local attires, and plastic wares were found in the rooms. Outside, newly hung laundries were waiting to dry and children scampered around.
What turns out to be a settlement for nearly 2,500 displaced people is originally a public primary school facility in Kuta town. Now, the activities of the people uprooted by war from different parts of the state are hampering academic activities in the place.
When PREMIUM TIMES visited the school-turned-camp, it was difficult to establish if learning was taking place as many of the classrooms had turned homes for the displaced persons who said their hope of returning home needed to be clearer.
At 10 a.m., children in tattered school uniforms were seen sauntering around the premises. Their teachers were nowhere to be found. As insurgency and banditry consume interior communities of the state, thousands of victims seek refuge in more protected towns and settlements, including the Central Primary School of Kuta town. But as they trooped in, the chances of children seeking basic education were more undermined.
Sadly, Kuta residents described the place as the best and biggest school in the town before it became a settlement for displaced persons. Several parents whom PREMIUM TIMES interviewed on the streets of the town said they have had to withdraw their kids from the school because “it has become overcrowded since IDPs started using the place.”
