Created with sole aim of ending the asymmetric war, where rogue elements attack and go into hiding such as seen in many cases of kidnapping of schoolchildren, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) Rapid Response Female Squad was formed in June 2021 to provide security to 81, 000 schools identified as porous to kidnapping and to promote gender balancing in the agency. The squad’s chief mission is keeping schoolchildren safe from kidnappers. Three years after the establishment, TINA ABEKU interrogates the scorecard of the squad with a view to establish the imperativeness of its continued existence.

To tackle rising insecurity in the country, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), a para-military organisation and infrastructure included in their mandate the protection of schools and other educational institutions against vandalism and theft.

Over the years, the Corps has deployed several measures to ensure maximum security in schools and foster the pupils’ safety. Among these measures is the establishment of a Rapid Response Female Squad (RRFS), in June 2021, to complement efforts of other squads, especially in the protection of 81, 000 schools identified to be porous to kidnapping and to also promote gender diversity in the agency.

The unabated spate of abductions across schools in Nigeria and the seeming inability of security agencies to neither rescue the victims nor arrest perpetrators has raised questions on the capability of the NSCDC squad to actually fulfill its chief mission – protection of schools from attacks and foiling kidnap attempts.

The recent and shocking kidnapping of hundreds of schoolchildren and other individuals in Kuriga, Chikun Council of Kaduna State could be likened to a déjà vu situation where the more you see, the less you understand.

Although authorities announced successful rescue of the abductees, howbeit, now claimed to be 137 in number, has left an indelible scar on the nation’s psyche and brought to the fore weakness and inefficiency of the security agencies, in this case, the NSCDC female squad to foil school kidnap attempts, call for reinforcements from sister agencies and tackle the social menace.

While authorities have assured that the present challenges will soon be a thing of the past, Nigerians are, however, worried that kidnappings for ransom of schoolchildren, its attendant consequences will be with us for a long time, as it is worsened by the seeming handicap of government and failure of security forces to end the crime. Some observers have adduced several reasons the NSCDC female squad has proven ineffective in protecting schools and children from abductions. One of such reasons is the insufficient number of personnel to contain the large number of pupils in schools.

Reports indicate that most schools only have one or two female officers to cover the entire school community and this means that there is little or no security presence in the event of an attack, leaving pupils vulnerable to kidnap and harm.

Commenting on the issue, Founder, Lola Cater for the Needy Foundation, Olalade Ogunnubi, said not allowing the safe school squad to carry guns while within the school premises is a drawback in case of sudden attack from kidnappers.

She notes that the female squad also lacks adequate training to tackle sophisticated, well-armed, and highly organised criminal gangs involved in the banditry and kidnapping.

“The female squad is not allowed to use ammunition in the schools, so, I think for the squad to be effective, a lot has to do with community engagement because people need to be oriented on these issues and the red flags to look out for. Community members and schools as well need to know what to look out for to take precaution. Also, inadequate resources can be a major problem because if they are not there, it will almost impossible to implement any project.”

She said the NSCDC needs to collaborate with local communities and engage local intelligence networks adequately. Research has shown that kidnappings are often preceded by surveillance, and overcoming community-police distrust is crucial in intelligence gathering.

The NSCDC, therefore, needs to work more closely with communities, district heads, local vigilantes, and non-governmental organisations to obtain the required assistance concerning security information.

Another observation Ogunnubi made, is that the continuous attacks on schools indicate that the security architecture designed for those schools is inadequate, and the NSCDC female squad’s efforts are insignificant.

Meanwhile, a report conducted by the NSCDC also showed deficiency in infrastructure, including fencing, security cameras, and panic alarms. This lack of infrastructure limits the effectiveness of the NSCDC female squad in securing the school premises.

She calls for training and retraining of field officers to boost their efficiency while adequate resources, patrol vehicles, weapons and ammunition should be provided to enable personnel deal with heavily armed insurgents and kidnappers.

Although the squad has recorded gains in its about three years of existence, the challenges ahead definitely demand a scaling up of its efforts to counter new trends in the asymmetric war facing the country especially its mandate of securing the schools. Commandant General of the corps, Dr. Ahmed Audi, while unveiling the unit, said that the female squad was a child of necessity to meet growing insecurity challenges and to cater for the government’s ‘Safe Schools’ Initiative’. He expressed the agency’s doggedness and readiness to confront kidnapping, banditry and other activities within and around school environments.

Pledging that the agency will not rest on its oars to ensure safety in schools across Nigeria, Audi said at the unveiling: “The quest for security stability in our country continues to remain a holy grail with ceaseless and unabated cases of banditry, kidnapping, armed robbery, insurgency, terrorism among others and all these have continued to threatened our country’s cohesion, stability and territorial integrity.”

Similar point was reechoed during the just-concluded celebration of the International Civil Defence Organisation (ICDO) which also coincided with the marking of his three years in office as Audi insisted that the squad has been instrumental in foiling kidnap attempt in 83 schools across the federation, a claim some say is quite commendable but still a far cry considering wide scale or perhaps large numbers of kidnappings disaster facing Nigeria.

Apart from kidnapping of schoolchildren, Nigerians are being kidnapped for ransom in their homes, on the roads, in the farms and everywhere. Even the nation’s capital, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, is not spared as it became a kidnapping hot spot right from the beginning of the New Year 2024, observed public affairs analyst and columnist, Simon Reef.

“We will continue to experience abduction and kidnappings in the years and the days to come unless the government sits down to find out what is really the problem.

“One of the reasons behind it is the material quest by these criminals. Another reason is that those carrying out the crime have seen abduction as very lucrative because it is an easy way of making money for themselves compared to any other job they will do. Also, a major reason it seems very difficult to end the scourge is because of the high level of poverty in Nigeria,” Reef said.

He notes that the failure of security forces aided by rogue elements in the security among them, is giving strength to perpetrators to continue in such crimes.

According to him, for government to find lasting solution to tackling the spate of kidnappings, “you have to come up with stringent measures such as the adoption of capital punishment against abductors and kidnappers.”

Reef adds: “Those who do these kidnappings are doing it on behalf of gangs and real kidnappers are being paid pittance because they are working for their big men in tow. Because it is an organized crime, it involves banks, doctors and very rich individuals and I am yet to see the commitment of the federal government and the security forces on how they can pin these criminals.”

And in furtherance of efforts to address insecurity in schools, its negative impact on the education system and national development as well as close gaps in its operations, the agency, in May 2023, collapsed the RRFS into the ‘Safe Schools’ Special Response Squad and blended with the safe schools initiative of the Federal Government introduced in 2014.

Audi then, announced the change at its 2023 first quarterly meeting with the NSCDC Commanders and Commandants across the country to x-ray and review the corps’ operations.

He said: “In fulfillment of its mandate, the Corps has already set up an armed unit known as the Safe School Special Response Squad (SSSRS) to ensure proper protection of schools across the country and to further enhance operations of this new squad, the existing Rapid Response Squad and Female Squad have been collapsed into this squad.

“The new squad will undertake regular patrol and response to distress calls from schools and host communities and their duties have been clearly spelt out in the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP).”

As a flashback, it appears the creation of the National Safe Schools Security and Emergency Response (NSSSER), a marriage involving the Federal Government’s safe school initiative introduced in 2014 and the NSCDC Safe School Special Response Squad (SSSRS) and other security agencies such as the police, army and others has failed to prevent the spate of abductions of pupils and attacks on schools across the country.

The Niger State Kagara school abduction in 2021 for example, which occurred in the presence of the NSCDC female squad, exposed the incapacity of the corps to quell the worsening spate of school attack and exposed the inadequacy of the nation’s security apparatus.

Security experts have also said there are challenges hindering effective operations of the newly formed safe school special response squad such as funding and lack of will to move into local communities to secure schools after collecting allocations meant for such purpose.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Conflict and Security Development Consult, and an expert on safety and security, Group Captain Sadeeq Garba-Shehu (retd), said so far, there have been 75 reported cases of school abductions in Nigeria with 53 in the Northwest region (about 70 per cent), including Kaduna, Katsina, Zamfara, Sokoto and Niger states.

“The reality is that we must accept that apart from high profile official launches by the civil defence, by the police and by the military of events in Abuja saying that safe school has started, the truth we must accept is that on the ground across local schools, there is nothing like safe school.

“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has already sounded the call that all school must be secured. When you talk about safe schools, there are things that the Federal Government can do, there are things that the state governments can do, there are things that local governments can do with regards to schools’ safety and there are things that host communities of schools can do to improve schools’ safety and security.

“We need to move down school safety and security from Abuja to the local communities. I think we should stop paying lip service about safe schools or safe schools initiative and actually go to the grassroots and mobilise.”

Also, National Coordinator, Financing Safe Schools Initiative of the Federal Government, Halima Iliya, believes funding has been a challenge, but confirmed an earlier release of N15 billion as against N3.58 billion allocation for the year 2023.

“At that point of even the flag off towards the end of last year, resources were not released timely that is why you may not feel the impact,” she said.