Unsafe Zamfara Schools Endanger, Push More Children Out of School

Abubakar Sani wore a blank expression that concealed his mood and made it difficult to discern the stories his eyes could tell. Residing in Gwashi, a village in Bukkuyum Local Government Area (LGA) of Zamfara State, he has witnessed the evolution of terror activities by terrorists currently ravaging Nigeria’s Northwest.

At first, he said, the attackers didn’t kill when they came. “They would just shoot into the air and loot stores and shops. Weeks later, they would return,” he told PREMIUM TIMES in September 2024.

The terrorists also stole livestock during their raids. Over time, they became emboldened, regularly kidnapping people and demanding ransom payments. Gradually, they instilled fear in Gwashi and neighbouring communities, disrupting normal life.

One significant disruption occurred at the village’s only primary school, where Mr Sani is the headmaster. Four of the seven teachers, who lived in the local government headquarters in Bukkuyum, stopped coming to the school due to fear of attacks. Less than a year later, in 2021, the school was closed.

“When they kidnapped some students in Kebbi (another state in the region), we started getting scared. So, we decided to shut the school to wait for things to cool off before resuming,” he explained. As of September 2024, when PREMIUM  TIMES interviewed him in Anka LGA of the state, the school remained shut. 

Similar stories abound in rural Zamfara communities affected by terrorism. Through interviews and research conducted across several LGAs between September and October 2024, PREMIUM TIMES compiled a list of over 60 schools, like that in Gwashi, that are currently closed due to fears of terror attacks. 

In Anka, Bukkuyum, Maru, Shinkafi, Zurmi, and Tsafe LGAs, thousands of children have been denied their first opportunity for education.

Zamfara State already had a fractured basic education system, with one of Nigeria’s highest rates of out-of-school children. It was also classified as an educationally disadvantaged state. “The banditry activities have compounded the already limited access and poor quality of teaching and learning in rural areas,” noted two researchers from the Federal University Gusau in a study examining the effects of terrorism on education.

A perpetual casualty of conflicts

In Northwest Nigeria, where Zamfara is located, terrorists have terrorised communities by raiding homes, stealing residents’ belongings, kidnapping for ransom, forcing people into labour, and killing those who resist. This has persisted for more than a decade, as authorities struggle to contain the crisis. Terrorists has disrupted daily life and affected every facet of social and economic development in the impacted communities.

Education, a perpetual casualty of conflicts, has suffered significantly. With schools closed, more children of school age are left outside the classroom, losing their first opportunity for education. Teachers, most of whom live outside rural communities, are unable to attend schools due to fear of attacks, according to those interviewed for this report.

Between 2020 and 2021, terrorists abducted over 1,700 students and teachers in more than 20 separate attacks, according to data compiled by SBM Intelligence. This situation has exacerbated the country’s already staggering number of out-of-school children, now exceeding 20 million, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO)—one of the highest figures globally.

Decreasing enrolments

Nafisa Isa’s daily routine looks very different nowadays. She and her three school-aged children—Aliyu, 8; Isa, 7; and Farida, 5—now sleep past the first crow of the rooster. They no longer have to wake up early for school. In Abare, a village in Anka LGA where she lives, none of the children need to anymore.

Mrs Isa, a teacher at the only primary school in the village, explained that persistent terror attacks in the community heightened fears among parents and teachers, gradually crippling basic education in the town. Parents, fearing for their children’s safety, stopped sending them to school. Teachers, likewise, ceased attending classes.

“It’s been a year and three months since the school was forced to shut down,” she told PREMIUM TIMES in September, adding that the closure happened almost organically as fear took hold.

Aliyu, her eldest son, is now enrolled in a carpentry shop, where he learns to make furniture. His siblings spend their days playing with other children in the area. “But there’s nothing like going to school,” she lamented.

Close to a dozen other teachers and school heads interviewed for this story corroborated Mrs Isa’s account of declining enrolments. For instance, Abubakar Sani explained how insecurity caused the number of pupils in his school to drop significantly. The enrollment, which once exceeded 250, fell sharply to 119 in 2021—the same year the school was shut.

Muhammad Abdullahi, a lecturer and researcher at the Federal University Gusau, described the situation as having a multifaceted disadvantage for Zamfara State.

Mr Abdullahi, who co-authored a study examining the impact of banditry on school enrolment, explained that the communities are not only suffering now but also facing a bleak future. “The development of any society is championed by its young and educated population,” he said. “These communities are increasingly lacking that, as the growing number of youths are left idle at home.”

“One of the facets of development is to have a youthful population,” he added during a telephone interview. “But banditry is rendering the future youth redundant. It has a multifaceted impact on the state.”

Mr Abdullahi warned that instead of contributing to their communities’ development, the younger population might endanger the state further.

A snippet on attacks on schools

Rural terrorism, which Mr Abdullahi describes as banditry and as a consequence of the lack of education, did not immediately affect schools until the terrorists began drawing inspiration from Boko Haram, the terrorist group active in Nigeria’s North East. In 2014, Boko Haram gained global notoriety when it abducted over 200 schoolgirls from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State—an unprecedented act in Nigeria’s history.

Emulating Boko Haram’s tactics, rural terrorists carried out their first mass abduction of pupils in Kankara, a community in neighbouring Katsina State, in December 2020. Riding motorcycles, they kidnapped more than 300 students from the Government Science Secondary School, Kankara. The students spent at least seven days in the forest hideout before the government negotiated their release.

It did not take long for other terror groups to attempt similar abductions. Some succeeded, while others failed. For instance, in February 2021, terrorists conducted mass abductions at two different schools in the region within ten days. On Feb. 17 2021, they abducted 41 pupils and teachers from the Government Science College in Kagara, Niger State. Then, on Feb. 26 2021, they raided the Government Girls Science Secondary School in Jangebe, Zamfara State, abducting over 300 schoolgirls.

The closure of schools in volatile communities subsequently became routine in the region. In 2021, Zamfara State ordered the closure of more than 70 schools following a series of terror attacks on educational institutions. However, many additional schools were shut not by official directives but out of fear of further attacks, as some school heads told PREMIUM TIMES.

Back to school? ‘No’

Hadiza Adamu is still haunted by the experience of having a child kidnapped. Her daughter, Hafsat, now 19, was one of the school girls kidnapped from their dormitories in Jangebe in February 2021.

“It was a harrowing experience,” she said, describing the two weeks the students were away with the terrorists. “I cried so much. I was so scared. I thought about many things that could go wrong. But I’m happy they came back. The government tried in that aspect.”

Hafsat has now re-enrolled at the Government Girls Unity Secondary School, Kwatarkwashi.

“I didn’t want her to go back to boarding school, but I was convinced to allow her to go,” she added.

But the story is not the same for some of her school mates as some were never re-enrolled into school after the abductions. 

For instance, Raliya Abbas, 20, is already in the third year of her marriage. She quit school after the abduction. “I didn’t want to experience that again so I got married,” she said.

She added, however, that she would love to go back to school again if possible. Her reason, she said, is because she believed there’s a need to have nurses and midwives in her community.

“It’s simply because of childbirth,” she said. “We don’t have skilled midwives. That’s why I wish to go back to school.”

Unsafe Schools violates safe school declaration

The fear of terror attacks has forced the Government Day Secondary School (GDSS), Gwashi, in Bukkuyum LGA, to shut down and reopen four times in the past three years.

In late September 2024, two weeks after schools across the country resumed for a new academic session, Garba Bukkuyum, the principal of the school, expressed uncertainty about when—or if—his school would reopen.

“Sometimes, we would be in the classrooms and hear gunshots and the roar of motorcycles speeding past,” Mr Bukkuyum said. “There’s no way you won’t be scared.”

Meanwhile, Bello Ahmad, the principal of GDSS Lugga in Maru LGA, has resigned himself to the situation.

When PREMIUM TIMES approached him one Tuesday afternoon in October 2024, he said it was the first time anyone had enquired about the school’s closure in more than three years. The school was shut in 2021 following a severe deterioration in security.

“The truth is, the situation is improving around here,” he said. However, he added that there is no timeline for reopening, as discussions on the matter have yet to begin.

In 2019, former President Muhammadu Buhari signed the Safe Schools Declaration—an expression of Nigeria’s commitment to protecting students, teachers, and schools from attacks. Two years later, in 2021, the Nigerian government introduced the National Policy on Safe Schools and Violence-Free Schools (NPSSVFS). The policy outlines guidelines intended to ensure the safety of Nigerian schools.

However, the gap between policy formulation and implementation remains significant, as noted by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in a report monitoring the policy’s progress in ten states, including Zamfara.

The report assessed states using six areas of the Minimum Standards for Safe Schools (MSSS): strong school systems, violence against children, natural hazards, conflict, everyday hazards, and safe school infrastructure.

According to the report, over 70 per cent of schools in Zamfara State fail to meet the minimum safety standards outlined in the safe school policy. It also noted that Zamfara stands out as “the only state scoring below 50 per cent across all six result areas.”

While the report acknowledged an increase in school infrastructure “between mid- and late 2023, particularly in making schools and learning centres more child-friendly,” it emphasised that “despite these gains, scores remain critically low across all areas, especially in Conflict, Everyday Hazards, and Safe School Infrastructure.” It concluded with a call for urgent and comprehensive interventions in Zamfara.

Holding unto the last shred in ‘bandits depot’

In Barayar Zaki, Abdulrazak Musa is one of the few clinging to the fraying threads of education at the Government Day Secondary School (GSS) Barayar Zaki. During an interview in September 2024, which lasted over 30 minutes, Mr Musa shared more stories than time could permit. He had witnessed so much and had so many tales to tell.

“We are usually the first to know when the bandits arrive,” he began, recounting the plight of Barayar Zaki, a community he said is also known as the ‘bandits’ depot.’

According to Mr Musa, terrorists often travel by canoe via the river in Barayar Zaki, using it as a gateway to access communities in neighbouring Kaduna, Niger, and Sokoto states.

Much has changed since Mr Musa began working at the school in 2015. When he first arrived, there were over 15 teachers and more than 600 students. “Now, there are fewer than 200 students,” he said. Only five teachers still attend regularly.

In 2017, the school’s principal passed away (his death was unrelated to terrorism). Another principal was appointed to the school, but he never reported for duty due to security concerns. “That’s why I am acting principal,” Mr Musa explained. “As you can see, I’m young.”

Despite feeling unprepared for the role, Mr Musa has been leading the school—the only secondary school in the community—for the past five years. He considers it his contribution to an education system that is on the brink of collapse.

“Education here is falling apart, but we are trying to hold it together,” he said.

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This story was produced with support from the Tiger Eye Foundation under the “On Nigeria Programme”, funded by the MacArthur Foundation.