Over 13 million Nigerian children out of school, says Gombe governor

About 13.2 million children in Nigeria, an equivalent of seven per cent of the country’s population, are out of school, Governor Mohammed Yahaya of Gombe State stated, yesterday.

Flagging off the domestication of At Risk Children Project (ARC-P) in the state, Yahaya explained that nearly 70 per cent of these children are in Northern Nigeria where the Almajiri system is widely practised.

According to him, the Almajiri menace is not only worrisome, but has also become endemic.

He said, “In Gombe State, recent enumeration conducted by our administration through the Better Education and Service Delivery for All (BESDA) project estimated that over 700,000 children are out of school across all the 11 local councils, quite above the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimated figure of about 550,000.”