Organisation begins campaign on school enrolment in Yola

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With the aim to encourage street children known in Northern Nigeria as ‘Almajiris’ into schools, an access campaign on school enrolment has begun in Yola, the capital of Nigeria’s northeastern Adamawa State.  The campaign,  according to Media Coordinator, 1 GAME Campaign, Okon Nya, also offers learning support by providing more than 10,000 Yola pupils with stationery. Nya stated in a release that: “Initiated by 1 GAME Campaign and supported by the Adamawa State Ministry of Education, the plan will involve airing of messages in the electronic media, advocacy visits to traditional, religious, community, women and youth leaders, town hall meetings and a door-to door campaign, all with an aim to get children into classrooms and learning,” he explained.  Also speaking, 1 GAME representative in Adamawa, Jackson Akor, said: “We are committed to achieving our objective of ensuring that every Nigerian child has access to free and compulsory basic education.  “That is why 1 GAME has initiated various programmes to create access to education for the Nigerian children.  “We are getting everyone involved, from political leaders to village heads. We don’t want any child in Yola to be left out of school.  “Nigeria’s Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) estimates that over 141,951 children of school age in Adamawa State roam the streets as beggars without access to education. Only Taraba with 63,168 and Gombe with 123,923 have lesser amount of street children among states in the country’s North-East region than Adamawa.  Non-school attendance is highest among Nigeria’s northeastern states with only 49 percent of school age boys and 37 percent of girls of the same age attending school.