The National Safe School Response Coordination Centre Commander, Hameed Abodunrin, tells IMOLEAYO OYEDEYI about the steady rise of deadly attacks on schools in Nigeria and how far the centre has gone on the N145bn safe school project
On February 20, 2023, your centre was established by the Federal Government and saddled with the responsibility of coordinating safety and security responses against violence in schools and host communities. It is over a year now. How has the journey been?
I will say the journey has been tough. We have had our challenges. When the centre was established, the resources to start were not provided immediately. The centre was established in February, but the resources started coming to the centre late last year. During the establishment of the centre, the Civil Defence was drafted in to give initial support to it with the hope that as time went on, the needed resources for the centre would come in and accelerate work at the centre.
So, the building and equipment for the Command and Control Centre were provided by the Civil Defence. But towards the end of last year, the Federal Government mobilised resources, not only for the centre and the Civil Defence, but for all stakeholders, including the military, the Department of State Service, and the Ministry of Education, among others. This is because, in the safe school project, all these stakeholders have their roles to play. But so far, so good, I can say that we have been facing our challenges, and they haven’t been beyond coping capacity.
Are you saying that when the centre was established by the Federal Government in response to the rising attacks on public schools in the country, there was no provision made at all for its take-off?
Yes, there was no provision to take off. But you know when we are talking about safety and security; it is not as if it is a new thing. Different agencies have been playing their roles as security agencies. All over the world, Civil Defence is known for providing security education for members of the public, coordinating emergencies, and others. If you look at the issues of safety in schools, they fall under this purview.
Recall that in 2019, there was a national security strategy that placed the mandate of being a lead agency in the protection of physical national assets and infrastructure on Civil Defence. But because of the problems that the schools started having, the public schools were again designated as one of the critical national assets of the country.
So, there was nothing like a take-off grant or anything, but just an advancement of what will be done. So far, one of the duties the centre has been carrying out is to also register all schools. Those are the things that they were doing before the resources started coming in. There was also the need for the centre to start training personnel on specific issues about safe schools.
At which exact month did your centre receive the needed provisions from the Federal Government late last year, and what were the provisions?
I think it was around August and September. And to the second part of the question, funds were made available to the centre.
How much?
Well, specifically, I may not be able to say this is how much we received. But for 2023, generally, N15bn was budgeted. But all agencies have been talking about a funding gap. You know, what I told you is the budgetary allocations for 2023, and it is meant for advocacy and training of personnel. So, each of the agencies has what it should get. Don’t forget that I came here in January 2024 and the funds have been allocated before I came into office. So, I had to go into records and start looking for what was allocated and others.
So, you are saying N15bn was allocated for the centre in 2023?
I only said N15bn was budgeted for safe school in 2023. It was not for the centre alone; it was for the safe school project, and the budgeted N15bn was meant for all stakeholders, including the military, Army, Navy, VIA, DSS, NPF, and others. So, it is not for the centre alone. The centre is just a coordinating point to receive actionable information and disseminate it to the appropriate agencies to act. Parts of the N15bn also went to the Ministry of Education for their training as well. So, it is not for the centre, but for a safe school.
What was budgeted for safe schools between 2023 and 2026, was to be a four-year project with the hope that by 2026, there will be no more problems with the safety of schools. So, the sum of N104bn was budgeted to be spread over those four years. But I think because of a lack of resources, they couldn’t release more than N15bn in 2023. Now, for this year that you are asking, as I speak to you, nothing has been allocated. As far as I know, both the Civil Defence and the centre have not received any money this year.
Was there any way that the delay in getting needed provisions from the government affected the performance of the centre in 2023?
Definitely! What should be done in 2023 was purely advocacy, training of personnel, and equipping the centre, not only at the national level but also the creation of centres at the state level. But the money didn’t come when it ought to come. And even when the funds eventually came to the centre, it was not a 100 per cent release. Everybody knows that there is always a difference between whatever is budgeted and the actual money released. So, there was no way the centre could have done everything that year. However, the centre has done the training and done some community engagements up till January 2024. They have completed that. I know that other agencies too have started their training.
Despite the lateness of financial provisions, was the centre able to train the actual number of personnel it should have trained last year?
Yes. You know I told you that it was because we were having problems with schools now as kidnappers and bandits had continued to attack schools. That is why the whole thing is coming up as if it’s a fresh thing. But it is not. The routine way of protecting schools and host communities has always been there. The only thing is that we have to increase the number of personnel that will now be involved. We have to also increase the number of personnel that we have to train for specific assignments on the project.
Ordinarily, nobody was talking about protecting the schools, especially in the past. That was why we only tried to escalate what we had been doing. On the idea of agencies coming together, it is on record that before the safe school, the agencies have been working at cross purposes and if there was anything they needed to do for one another, probably the Commissioner of Police could call the Commandant of Civil Defence or the Director of DSS and they work it out. But this time, because there is a need for a coordinator for school safety, that is what the centre is now doing. I believe the centre was still able to do what it ought to do up till January this year despite not getting the required funds early.
Then, where did the centre get the money it used to train personnel before the expected funds from the government came?
The initial funds came from Civil Defence because it provided the buildings and equipment and trained a few of its personnel before the funds came in.
But despite the existence of the centre since February 2023, the country has witnessed a steady rise in attacks on schools in the country. Why is this so, and what effort has the centre made to checkmate this?
You know that there has been a general issue about insecurity. Meanwhile, for every attack that is reported and known, I can tell that probably there are more than 100 others that have been prevented. But it is not right to keep announcing this, because the fear of insecurity is worse than insecurity itself. If you are afraid that something will happen to you, you won’t be able to do anything, not even to worship God. If we tell parents that in this school today, we were able to stop this attack, no parent will send their child to school the next day.
So, it is the attack incidents that could not be hidden and not reported that you have seen. One thing the centre has done is to enhance its capacity such that it would have got information about an impending attack even before it happens. To do this, a website was launched where schools can register. When you are registering your school, particularly when you do that on the premises of the school, the website is so designed that during the registration, it will geo-locate the school. So, if there is any problem, the centre will know, and if there is a need for a fast response, the centre can use that geo-location to find where the problem is for the school.
Unfortunately, the schools were initially very reluctant to register. There was this notion that probably when they registered, what would follow would be taxation. So, the centre is just making the people know that they are not going to pay any tax or pay for registration. Meanwhile, there are two issues with the registration. Some don’t want to register because they fear that they may be taxed.
Then, we have also been told that when registering a school, we have to verify it, because some people believe that they will get something through the number of schools registered and may want to inflate the registration figures. So to forestall that, desk officers have been appointed for the centre in all the local governments in Nigeria.
We also have divisions in each of the local governments, and we are not leaving the issue of registration for the school principals and teachers alone now. Desk officers are now going to the schools to interact with them and register their schools. When we started the physical registration, some schools gave us issues, requesting letters from the Ministry of Education before they could allow our officers to register them. So, when the Education Minister visited the centre, we explained the problems to him and he offered to write every state governor in the country.
Don’t forget that education is on a Concurrent List, which means the three tiers of government have their roles. Unfortunately, most of the schools don’t belong to the Federal Government. But the Ministry of Education has written to all the state governors for the cooperation. On the issue, the ministry has also held a stakeholders’ meeting, which was attended by both the Minister of Education and the Minister of State for Education. At the meeting, the stakeholders all agreed that it is a joint problem that we have to solve together. So, by the time our desk officers start going to schools now, I know that there will be no problem. The schools are just resuming.
In March, you said that in a bid to forestall attacks and kidnapping in schools, some state governors have begun donating facilities and offices to kick start the establishment of the safe school response coordination centre in their states. Can you mention some of the states that have made these provisions so far and the efforts the centre has made to reach out to other states that haven’t done so?
Yes, Benue State has done that. The state government initially donated a building, but they felt that the location of the structure was vulnerable to attack. So, they are building a new centre within the premises of the Civil Defence so that it can be well protected and nobody will be able to tamper with its data.
Also, Nasarawa State has made a commitment and donated. Katsina State has also donated a building. Though Rivers State initially donated a building, something later happened and we are still on it. The building is just there because there have been issues in the state. Then, I think one other state in the northern part of the country has also donated a building for the centre in the state.
So, that is the stage we are in. Don’t forget that it was stated in the letter written by the minister to the state governors that according to the national plan, it is the responsibility of the state governments to provide these centres, while the Federal Government will release a part of the funds to equip the centre. So, the state government can provide the centre and do whatever little thing they can do there to make the project run in their states. But the Federal Government should keep funding and equipping it.
You just mentioned about five states out of a possible 36 states of the federation, including the FCT. Are you saying it is only these five states that have shown commitment to the Safe School Project by making provisions for it so far?
Yes, only five states. Those are the states that have said, look this is the centre we are giving you for the project. Other states said they had just included it in their budget and plans for this year. Don’t forget that these activities just started about two months ago. That is where the problem is. Ordinarily, it should have started at the beginning of last year. But it is just starting this year. So, those who have made provisions are those who have shown commitment before the end of last year.
