#TrackNigeria – The new administrations at the federal and states level in Nigeria, have been asked to prioritise addressing issues affecting girls and children.
Plan International Nigeria, a non-governmental organisation working to advance children’s rights and equality for girls, said this in a message to the new government in the country.
According to the organisation’s Country Director, Dr Hussaini Abdu, “it is time for the government to put issues concerning the girl child in the front burner. Successive governments have virtually left issue concerning girls on the back seat while the challenges mount.
“Across the length and breadth of the country, girls are caught up in one crisis or the other-from forced marriage to being child brides, teenage pregnancy, kidnapping, child labour and rape”.
May 29th, 2019 marks another significant milestone in Nigeria’s political history as winners of the last general elections are sworn into their various offices.
Abdu noted that Nigeria, according to a 2018 UNICEF report, is home to 22 million child brides, the highest in the world.
“This accounts for 40 percent of child brides in the West Africa sub region. This is unacceptable for our country, Nigeria,” says the Country Director.
“We can do much better than this. It is high time the federal government did much more than rhetoric by taking practical steps to safeguard the Nigerian girl,” Abdu said.
He said it was painful to know that 60 percent of the more than 10 million out of school children in Nigeria are girls.
“A nation that belittles 50 percent of its population is preparing a doomed future for itself. The government at all levels must prioritise its young population especially girls. We must say no to child bride, we must say no to rape and we must say yes to education of the girl and yes to safety of every child in the country,” Abdu said.
The country director also called on the national assembly to pass laws that are unambiguous and rewards good practices and punishes wrong doers irrespective of the perpetuators. He particularly identified the provision of the constitution that sets age limit for marriage for girls at 18 but in another breath provides that girls automatically becomes adults once they are married irrespective of their ages at the time of marriage.
“This ambiguity provides leeway for paedophilias and child abusers who hide under the cover of legality”.
