Ogun state has nine registered Universities, the highest of any state in Nigeria, whereas Osun state has four or five .What a proactive enterprise, to ensure that there are enough to feed the universities
This should be taken up as a Federal government project. After all investment in children is investment in the future of the country if mobile phones could be bought and distributed to farmers, then these devices can be bought and made available to our kids, with assistance by the state governments
Children spend quality time face booking, but the contents are mostly on relationships, infatuation, self love etc. they could be redirected to use the equipment to create learning groups, exchange groups, interschool study groups etc
Time spent on wandering /loitering/idling /games can be studied and findings used to review/improve the project
Routine screening can be done on street children (with incentives) to evaluate. psychiatric/mental health, to know those already on alcohol, other drugs including hard drugs
Research—knowledge attitude and perception ( kAP) studies, can also be sponsored to seek out candidates suitable for rehabilitation…it may then be possible to know the extent of their involvement, identity of their social contacts, those being indoctrinated/brainwashed among other benefits. Some parents give no good examples and so the children have a teacher of bad habits in their Mom or Dad
Intending couples should be encouraged to think seriously about relationships before you go into one, so you don’t end up with unwanted pregnancies.
Health education, age appropriate should be encouraged in schools, churches and family fellowship.
Government should also pay more attention to funding in homes for motherless babies and orphanages.
It is time young girls stopped looking at Europe and America as pure heaven, reality is that they also have their own problems of people feeding directly from the dustbin.
Parents, churches should to the extent possible monitor what their children are doing in terms of face booking competition, faces simply do not represent human being.
What about what children are doing and being allowed to do in the different schools? How age appropriate are the messages they are getting? How gender sensitive. What relationship exists between teachers, pupils and students?
Who and how are records kept? In the Holy Trinity Grammar school of those days, the principal took the matter of children on the street very seriously.
He took time to ride bicycle and would chase students anywhere they ran, even into bushes and broth them into schools with severe disciplinary measures to serve as deterrent to others. Students were encouraged to go to the school libraries during free periods. Loitering was forbidden because they were used as avenues to dash to the streets
With the large population of this country, and the presence of vast portions of arable land, the School to land policy which was the brain child of a previous Military Government should be reexamined. Research has shown that more than half of the total number of street boys are secondary school dropouts, and The finance minister has been glad to announce that Non oil exports has now climbed to over 20%, while this is encouraging, poverty and hunger are two conditions which prepare many Nigerian Women(including pregnant women) and children for Malaria to complete the dying process. One sure way of eradicating hunger and perhaps poverty is to pump money into mechanized agriculture, send young people for training in specific areas, remove the fear attached to farming that farmers die young and because they die for subsistence die poor.
With milking machines, tractors, harvesters, incubators, with research laboratories, there will be enough to eat and family coherence needed to bring children close to their families can be guaranteed. Taking inventories, census of those living secondary schools, of youth corps members will enable proper planning and efficient management of a School to land initiative. It is a reliable way of getting children away from the streets, and reducing the number of children and young adults available for recruitment into various crimes and for trafficking.
With enough food to eat and sell, female children can have education to what ever level as desired. They will not need to sell their bodies for money, and even if they have to indulge, they will have the capacity to negotiate for safer sex.
Capacity building is not all about giving loans, that are tied to so many strings that recipients end up getting poorer while the banks declare unbelievable profits, the school to land initiative is a better alternative for those too poor or too young to assess bank loans.
Governments, National orientation agency and others concerned with the welfare of Children should engage schools, colleges, physicians in family health, child health and pediatrics and support them to carry out research in the problem of street children . Government should bring down the costs of adoption, but do more monitoring once the processes are done with. Relevant agencies can involve social workers in supervision and management of minor conditions.
Governments can build Science and Technology camps, mechanic, Lap top, and cell phone repair centers in strategic locations, where large groups of street boys congregate. Inventors can emerge from such camps and with positive reinforcement, others can emulate and aspire. Dreams and hope will metamorphose into reality, for the individual and for the family/
.It is time wealthy individuals, institutions, multinational companies began to show interest in Debates, quiz contest, and other activities that can reward excellence, and make the streets less attractive for children. Setting up football academies like the one by Channels TV organization is a very good one. The boys are playing fantastic foot ball and are likely to draw others of their age away from street life. Someone should try a similar experiment with the girls and you will be amazed. However, not every one plays foot ball, just as we don’t expect every child to know how to play the saxophone, or guitar, but every child needs an education. Those who give out 50 million naira to sponsor birthday parties for strangers in our midst as a way of showing they have money need to spare a few minutes to imagine what one million can do for a home for the motherless, being managed by Catholic missions. These catholic charity organizations will be wondering whether God gave Wealthy Nigerians such retrogressive mindset that we can actually prefer to build more houses abroad than give financial support to the needy, even within extended family systems.
Churches and religious organizations should encourage activities that teach children to avoid dangerous experiments, avoid attempting to do things they watch and see on television. Church programs for children should include insightful comments and activities on the fear of God, the love and respect for parents, family members and authorities. If Children can not find comfort, assurance and hope in Churches, they will find them on the street, if those telling them to give their lives to Christ hide to engage in anti Christian activities, Children will show that they too can hide and see what goes on in the dark, and if they cant give their lives to Christ, the devil, bacteria and dangerous viruses will all be very happy to take over such lives,
