The celebration of the 2024 World Children’s Day has come and gone but the scandalous statistics of the absymal quality of the life of the average Nigerian youth stare us all in the face. Lest we deceive ourselves, there is cause for serious concern, with regards to the educational, healthcare and socio-economic status of our children, that we, as adults would be leaving for them. For instance, according to the Chief of Field Office of UNICEF in Bauchi State, Dr.
Tushar Rane, Nigeria currently holds the ignoble record of being home to the largest number of out of school children. It is so alarming that 63% of primary school children regularly attend school. In fact, the number of school-aged children out-of-school has escalated from 10.
5 million as at Year 2020 to an alarming figure of 20 million in October, 2022. That is according to United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations (UNESCO). But that is not all there is to the low level of commitment to education of our younger generation.
According to the World Bank, Nigeria’s persisting learning poverty is so worrisome that about 70 % of the 10-year olds cannot understand simple sentence in the English language, or perform basic numeracy tasks! Yet, there is more to stir the conscience of patriotic Nigerians. Considering the parlous performance of the successive political leaders in the critical health sector, as at February 2024, some 35 million under-5 Nigerian children were considered as voiceless v.
