By Gift ChapiOdekina,Abuja

Ahead of the National Children’s Leadership Conference, Children of Africa Leadership and Values Development Initiative (CALDEV) has emphasized the need for children education which it says is a major way to end insecurity and other forms of crime in Nigeria.

The 2024 conference, scheduled to hold from November 17 to 21, aims to bring attention to the plight of children globally and commemorate Universal Children’s Day.

This year’s theme, “Empowering Young Voices, Building a Legacy for Sustainable Development,” will feature leadership orientation sessions, skill acquisition, advocacy, and panel discussions.

Speaking to newsmen at the media briefing on the plans for this year’s conference in Abuja, Rep Bamidele Salem who is a member of the House of Representatives and the Chairman House committee on Public Account, stated that the 2024 conference has been designed to bring to the front burner issues that bother on the plight of children all over the globe, adding that the conference will commemorate the Universal Children’s Day.

According to Salem, education is crucial in addressing insecurity, banditry, and other forms of crime in the country.

“Universal Children’s Day, as you may know, is a day that has been set aside by the United Nations to hold on the 20th of November every year. And we are about the only organization in this country that celebrates the Universal Children’s Day.

“This event is a testament to our collective commitment to shaping the leaders of this great country and empowering the next generation of Nigerian youth. We have assembled a team of very impacting speakers, people who can inspire these children, who can also help them to have a better understanding of the world they live in, and how they fit in as change agents in the society

“The theme for this year’s National Children’s Leadership Conference is Empowering Young Voices, Building a Legacy for Sustainable Development. Empowering Young Voices, Building a Legacy for Sustainable Development. And as usual, we’ll have a lot of sessions.We’ll have leadership orientation sessions, skill acquisition, advocacy, visits to places of interest, debates, quiz competitions, panel discussion programs.

“Children mentoring, children welfare, children advancement of the children should be put on the front burner of whatever we do. Now there is virtually no deal or law that you do that you pass in the House that does not also have ingredient of engagement. Some of those engagements you have seen with the House leadership have been with the youthful population. In fact more than any other assembly in recent past, the 10th Assembly has done a lot of advocacy.

“If you don’t put children in school, there is no way you can solve all these problems of insecurity, banditry, and what have you. If you do an analysis of people that are involved in banditry, in terrorism and whatever, just do an analysis. You can hardly find 5% that are graduates. They are mostly people that do not have access to education. So they are easily brainwashed. They are easily influenced by wrong ideologies, wrong interpretation of literature, or whatever.

He also commended the leadership of the 10th Assembly for its child-friendly approach, with the Speaker of the House of Representatives allowing a young girl to preside over a plenary session on the International Day of the Girl Child. This gesture, he said emphasizes the importance of children’s welfare and education in Nigeria.

“I want to assure you that the parliament, the 10th assembly especially, has been very child-friendly and will continue to be. The chairman of the House Committee on Women Affairs, Kafila Togbara has been a very big advocate of children development and youth advocacy.

“Major concerns of the CALDEV African. Every single year is how to get back our children to school. When people are schooled, when they are educated, they have critical mind. They are also able to affect society in a manner that makes them capable. They are developed so they can add value to society. And this is one area in which we have had engagement.

“We will continue to engage, especially the next stage of our engagement in this area will be with the state’s Houses of Assembly, because like you already know, education is the concurrent list of in the Nigerian constitution. So we believe that we need to engage more with the state’s Houses of Assembly on how to ensure that the laws they make the ones that they will make and the ones they have made are not only, you know, existing on paper. Let me show you.

“I was having a conversation with the universal basic education commission recently and they told me that almost half of the funds that the UBEC has that is meant to be accessed by states are not being accessed because many states of the federation are refusing to pay , how then will they be able to access these funds that they can use to build schools, employ teachers, train teachers and what have you.

“So this is a very, very huge problem and I believe that by the time we engage with states, houses of assembly, we will be able to deepen their understanding, their engagement and arouse more of their interest in the things that they need to do as government institutions at the state level to ensure that together there is a synergy federal, state, local, private sector to combat the issue of out of school children in Nigeria in a manner that will make it progressively reduced over a period of time.

“If you can take this number down from, maybe it’s about 11 point something million today, and within the next five years, if all these institutions will work together, within 10 years, I’m sure that we can go to less than 500,000, less than 1 million, you know, number of out-of-school children. Don’t forget, as we are combating the present figure, there are more children that are being born now. So, if we are not careful and we are not very proactive, the number will continue to increase.

“As an organization in CALDEV, Africa, we will do more engagement going forward with state governments, state houses of assembly, and other non-governmental ideals at the sub-national level in a manner that will make us combat these problems in a more productive manner.