The Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr Olukayode Egbetokun, says the police will continue to give priority to the safety and security of schools nationwide.
Egbetokun said this in Abuja at the inauguration of training on safe schools for state coordinators and divisional police officers (DPOs).
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the event also featured inauguration platforms, vehicles, and equipment for the Safe School programme.
Egbetokun said the training was designed to equip state coordinators and DPOs nationwide with comprehensive knowledge and strategies on national plans for the Safe Schools initiative.
According to him, it is aimed at crafting a definitive strategy for collaboration between the police and other vital stakeholders to ensure a more protected learning environment for schoolchildren.
He said the inauguration of the equipment was to optimise the human and material resources of the Nigeria Police in combating crimes, particularly those targeting educational institutions.
“We are committed to implementing measures and utilising our resources to diminish the threats facing students, staff, and educational facilities across the country.
“The current police administration has established the Special Intervention Squad to swiftly address and counteract criminal activities nationwide.
“This squad will operate in support of the School Protection Squad to ensure that the country’s educational facilities remain free from danger and unwelcome incidents,” he said.
He said the police would continue to work harmoniously with relevant security agencies and stakeholders, including host communities, to confront those attacking schools.
The I-G urged the participants to embrace the training with the utmost seriousness, adding that the knowledge and skills to be acquired would directly impact the quality of services to be rendered.
In her remarks, Mrs Halima Iliya, the National Coordinator, the Financing Safe Schools Secretariat, said that though the Nigerian educational system has always been in deep crisis, the kidnapping of schoolchildren represented a major extensional threat to the system.
She said the crisis had contributed to the huge population of out-of-school children in the country.
The coordinator called for a policy framework to provide sustainable funding to address the challenges.
Iliya said the absence of funding mechanisms from budgetary allocations by the federal and subnational governments was a challenge to attaining safe schools in the country.
Vanguard/Simeon Ugbodovon
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