Imo, Ekiti have lowest number of out-of-school children in Nigeria – UNICEF

The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) said on Tuesday that Imo and Ekiti States have the lowest number of out-of-school children in Nigeria.

The Chief of Measurement for Results (M4R) UNICEF, Mr. Claes Johanson, stated this at a two-day Media Dialogue on the Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey 6 (MIC6) Results in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

He put the percentage of out-of-school children in the two states at one and two percent respectively.

Kebbi (65 percent), Zamfara (61 percent) and Bauchi (61 percent) have the highest rates in the country.

The UNICEF official said 27 percent of children aged seven to 14 years have foundational reading skills while only 25 per cent are with foundational numeracy skills.

He added that the MIC6 had helped to fish out data in every sector that would help governments at all levels to analyse how plans were working and the causes of failures of such plans in some states.

Johanson said: “The lowest out-of-school rates are found in Ekiti (two per cent), and Imo (one per cent). The highest rates are in Kebbi (65 percent), Zamfara (61 percent) and Bauchi (61 percent).”

The figures, according to him, showed that Nigeria has not seen improvement in the number of out-of-school in the last five years.

He added: “The MIC6 cleared many things. In education and health, we have seen some of the most important findings. There is good news, we have seen that fewer children under five were dying.

READ ALSO: 10m Nigerian kids, 60% girls are out of school —UNICEF laments

“A large percentage of this is driven by an increase in immunisation.

“So, we had only 34 percent of children immunised five years ago. But now, we have 57 percent, which really calls for celebration.

“It is something we should really be happy about.

“We also see that there is room for improvement everywhere, particularly in education.

“For the first time, we are looking at children that are actually learning, and we see that only 25 percent have foundational numeracy.

“One out of four children does not even go to school, so, the number of out-of-school children is still one in four and that’s the same as five years ago.

“So, continuing education is the most important thing.”

The Digest of Basic Education Statistics released by the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) in 2018 showed that Kano, Akwa Ibom, Katsina, Kaduna, Taraba, Sokoto, Yobe, Zamfara, and Bauchi had the highest numbers of out-of-school children in the country.

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