Safe Schools Programme Seeks Collaboration With Local Hunters, Vigilantes

By Ayodele Oni

National Coordinator of the Safe Schools Initiative for Financing, Mrs. Halima Iliya,  has announced that there are plan to involve hunters and vigilantes in intelligence gathering to prevent attacks on schools nationwide.

The National Coordinator, who spoke to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Abuja, stated that active community involvement and educational outreach to students, parents, and teachers will commence in the second quarter of the year.

“As a component of the plan, for states with local vigilantes, we intend to train their hunters, vigilantes, and volunteers while for states without registered vigilantes, we intend to advocate the use of youths.

“Youths will volunteer to protect their communities because we cannot achieve anything within a community without their involvement.

“We will bring them to the security architecture for them to defend and protect their communities in the areas of intelligence gathering, prevention, and detection deterrent capabilities.”

Iliya revealed plans to utilize the National Orientation Agency (NOA) platform due to its widespread presence across all local governments.

She mentioned utilizing them to connect with grassroots communities by creating training manuals that can be translated into local dialects for effective communication.

“We are done with the second phase of the implementation of the safe schools national plan where all security agencies involved have trained their personnel on safe schooling which has been streamed into their operations.

“We have also written to all states, including the FCT, to furnish us with information on the most at-risk schools in the three senatorial zones and one tertiary institution.

“We want States to take ownership then we tailor the intervention towards this as these are the ways to make a significant impact.”