Insecurity: Bandits Force School Closure, Convert Classrooms To Hideout | AgegePulse Magazine

 

By Ayodele Ifasakin

Bandit

Bandits terrorising residents of Zamfara and forcing closure of schools have converted some classrooms to personal use in the North West State.

Daily Trust findings show that dozens of primary schools in highly traumatised remote rural communities had been taken over by armed criminals.

The schools were abandoned by the pupils and teachers as a result of the activities of the criminals.

According to residents, the head master of one primary school in Birnin Magaji Local Government Area of the state was once confronted by armed men who asked him to close lessons for the day as they intended to sleep in the classrooms.

Without any hesitation and knowing fully the consequences of not carrying out their order, the headmaster immediately closed the school and asked all the pupils to go home.

Daily Trust learnt that scored of armed bandits have been killed in airstrikes after they took shelter in the empty classrooms in the abandoned primary schools across the state.

Apart from this, there were schools affected by a lack of teachers because many had rejected posting to rural schools due to the risk associated with going there to teach.

Native Reporters

We were not elected to only pay salaries, governors declare

• Resign if you can’t pay, workers tell govs

Olusola Fabiyi and Eniola Akinkuotu

Governors under the auspices of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, have said that they are not elected to only pay salaries of civil servants.

They argued they were also elected to provide good roads, electricity, education and other necessary amenities for the people.

They said there was no way they could perform magic if there were no funds to work with.

They therefore called for the examination of the national income in the last 14 years to enable them to agree on the contentious issue of minimum wage implementation.

Chairman of the NGF, who is also the Governor of Zamfara State, Abdulaziz Yari, made their position known to journalists after the meeting of the governors in Abuja on Wednesday night.

One of our correspondents reports that the committee working on the minimum wage is almost concluding negotiations on the matter.

The Federal Government had set a September date to roll out a new minimum wage for workers.

The Nigeria Labour Congress is proposing a minimum wage of N65,000 for workers, but the governors are insisting on the gradual implementation of the new wage,  if eventually approved.

Yari said it was a pity that state governors had been limited to the payment of salaries alone in their respective states.

He said the lack of funds had hindered them from carrying out their responsibilities in other sectors such as health, electricity, education, roads, among others.

On minimum wage, he said, “We have a committee of six which represents us in discussions in the committee headed by the Minister of Labour, Dr Chris Ngige.

“The committee has yet to give us the final report. They have given us an interim report that at the Federal Government level, over 82 per cent is being spent on overheads which cannot move the country forward in terms of infrastructure development and development that we need now.

“So, on our own part, we are saying we are going to look at how our income is taken from our final account from 14 years ago so that we can come up and stay in the middle.”