2025 WCD: Jigawa  Children Demand Equal Access To Educational Opportunities 

By Mohammed Abubakar Dutse

As Nigeria joined the rest of the world to mark the 2025 World Children’s Day ( WCD) in Thursday, Jigawa children have appealed to the state government to provide them with the necessary favourable environment to enable them compete favourably with their counterparts from other parts of the world.

In their various submissions during the activities to mark WCD in Dutse the young people drawn from various secondary schools in the state capital and environs for example, called on the state government to among others expand their digital literacy, expansion of the government school feeding programme to cover more schools especially in the hard-to- reach areas if the state.

Other requests included the provision of school buses to many schools across the state to ease transportation problems, provision of potable drinking water as well as inclusion of young ones in the decision-making process of the state government

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The UN has designated November 20 every year as World Children’s Day to highlight the challenges facing the children  and as an avenue to raise awareness on the plights of children with a view to solving them collectively.

The occasion which had the State Head of Civil Service, Muhammad Kandira Dagaceri representing Governor Umar was put together by the state government in collaboration with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNiCEF).

The governor described the theme for this year’s celebration which is “Our Day, Our Rights” as apt, saying it was in sync with one of the state government’s 12-point agenda which has to do with the development of its youths as leaders of tomorrow.

He explained that the state government placed greater emphasis on the welfare and well-being of  the younger generation through fashioning out policies and programmes that would promote their growth especially in the area of information and communication technology, ( CT).

The governor recalled that it was the state pioneered ICT awareness in governance and has continued to be one of the leading state in that direction. He noted that Jigawa state indigenes have won laurels in the sector and have been making impacts in the ICT sector across the country.

Mr. Rahma Farah- Mahmoud, the UNiCEF Kano Field lauded the state government for its various interventions in child development programme in the state but noted that a lot still needed to be done.

The UNiCEF chief who was represented, however appealed to other stakeholders such as traditional, religious and community to leaders to join in the efforts of the state government to develop the future leaders noting that government alone could not effectively carry the burden