Securing Girl-child Secondary Education for Sustainable National Security: Focus on North Western Nigeria (Published)
Secondary schools, schools for the adolescents, are often place where intolerance, discrimination and violence exist, and girls are mostly at the receiving end. In this paper the concept of girl-child, security challenge, secondary school and sustainable national security were clarified. The paper also identified the types of security challenges in Nigeria which include bombings and killings, kidnapping and armed robbery attack, political and economic related assassinations. Security challenges identified to be affecting girl-child secondary education in North Western Nigeria include kidnapping and abduction, bullying and intimidations, sexual abuse and harassment, physical threats and insults. Some factors promoting security challenges in secondary schools include distance, poor facilities, lack of community cooperation, and leadership attitude to security issue. The paper identified ways of securing girl-child education to promote sustainable national security as provision of security fence, provision of security outfit, provision of school bus, installation of CCTV cameras, and taking serious legal action against girl-child abuse related cases. The paper suggested that, like financial institutions, secondary schools should be provided with enough security personnel. It also suggested that community should be fully enlighten and involved in providing security for secondary schools especially the girls’ schools.
Keywords: Girl Child, Secondary School, sustainable national security