No fewer than 80, 000 school children who were rendered homeless as a result of herdsmen attacks in parts of Benue State have been out of school in the state.
According to Chairman, Benue State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), Dr. Philip Tachin, such displaced children had been thrown out of school and hope of their returning to school had become dimmed.
Tachin, who spoke while fielding questions from journalists in Makurdi, said however that the figure was staggering, as the board was considering the need to engage competent contractors to rebuild ravaged structures as soon as the security situation in the affected communities improved.
He was, however, not handy with the exact number of schools affected and teachers employed by the board that died during the attacks. When he was asked, he said the situation had put such school children in a pathetic situation.
Tachim said: “The number of such school children is staggering, but according to statistics from the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA), which we depended on, 80, 000 of such out-of-school children are in the state.
“At the time I went to the Abagena IDPs’ camp, the children there alone were around 16, 000. It was when I was faced with this reality that I knew the kind of deep trouble that our children were in.
“I want to assure you that all schools that were destroyed by herdsmen, we will have to rebuild them. But the question is when, because some of the communities have not been able to go back yet. Those that were able to go back don’t even stay back, they farm and come back because these armed herdsmen still come to attack and kill people.
“So relatively, there is calm but it’s not that total security has returned to the villages of displaced persons and the farmers can’t even go back and so we can’t go back and start rebuilding those schools, because it will be a waste until we attain that absolute security or calmness when these communities are back with their children then we can rebuilt these schools.”
Tachin, who reaffirmed the board’s readiness to forward names of contractors that failed to complete SUBEB contracts awarded to them to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) by the end of this month, hailed the giant strides recorded by Governor Samuel Ortom in the last three years, describing critics of the governor over non-performance as mischief makers.
“For those who are saying that Ortom has not performed, they are mischievous people. I see Ortom winning his second term; I don’t see him losing, because he has achieved a lot in all sectors.”
